LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 

COPYRIGHT OFFICE. 

No registration of title of this 
article as a preliminary to copyright 
protection has been found. 

Forwarded to \ Mwi? S I Division Q^^t 7< f 9°9 

l-P4ft*9~ J jj (Date"/"" 

(1, iii, 1906—5,000.) s2--& 




Book_J_v_5_ 



THE 

DIVINE CREDENTIALS 
OF THE BIBLE 



BY 



THOMAS HAMILTON LEWIS, D.D. 

PRESIDENT OF WESTERN MARYLAND COLLEGE; 



BOARD OF PUBLICATION OF THE 

METHODIST PROTESTANT CHURCH 

BALTIMORE AND PITTSBURGH 






LiSHARY of CONGRESS 
One Copy Received 

JAN 7 1909 

Copyright Entry 

CLASS KXc. No. 

COPY A. 



Copyright, 1907, by 
T. H. LEWIS 



Received from 

^OPyrlqrht Office 



PREFACE 

I venture to offer to a somewhat wider audience a 
series of studies which were prepared with the view 
simply of helping college students to comprehend 
and accept the grounds on which the Bible is be- 
lieved to be a Divine Book. 

No claim of originality, either in matter or treat- 
ment, is made as justifying this publication. Al- 
though I have endeavored to work the material over 
in a conscientious way, yet I realize that everything 
has been said on this subject long ago; most of it 
being as old as the replies to Celsus, the first critic 
of Christianity. And my treatment of the material 
is just the ordinary way of the preacher who tries to 
find the truth and to bring it home to the con- 
science. Yes, I may as well confess it at the be- 
ginning, this is the work of a preacher. If any ex- 
tenuation of this fault may be admitted, I plead 
that the sermonic form has been made as little in- 
trusive as possible, and that since the addresses 
were delivered they have all been worked over with 
the view of giving them the coherence of a single 
subject. But they will still read like sermons, per- 
haps, and this I did not desire to avoid. For as I 

iii 



iv PKEFACE 

was trying in the first place to appeal to the con- 
science on behalf of the truth, so I would have this 
book continue to do so. 

Perhaps there was a time when the pulpit dwelt 
too much on Evidences, but the present generation 
knows nothing of such a time. Treatises of this 
sort exist almost without number, but they seldom 
come in the way of our young people. It is the ex- 
ception to find a young man or woman who has read 
a book, or even has heard a sermon devoted to the 
presentation of reasons for believing the Bible to be 
a Divine Book. The substance of this book was 
first thrown into the form of addresses to young 
students whose limitations and prepossessions were 
kept constantly in mind. They were kindly re- 
ceived and I have been repeatedly asked by those 
who heard them to publish them. Perhaps it may 
not be uninteresting to state how I was finally con- 
vinced that the publication might be serviceable. 

The audience for which these addresses were pre- 
pared consisted of about two hundred young men 
and women from seventeen to twenty-five years of 
age. They had all come from Christian homes, 
many of them were professing Christians, and none 
of them were infidels. Wishing to know how far I 
might venture in assuming them acquainted with 
the subject, I addressed to each one a letter asking 
an answer to the following questions: 1. Have 
you ever read a book on the Evidences of Christian- 
ity? 2. Have you ever heard a series of sermons or 



PEEFACE v 

lectures on this subject? 3. Do you remember to 
have heard at any time a sermon intended to prove 
that the Bible is a Divine Book? 4. Have you ever 
read a book or heard a lecture against the Bible? 

I received one hundred and seventy-seven replies. 
Eighty-seven answered all the questions in the neg- 
ative. Question 1 had one hundred and thirty-three 
negative and forty-four affirmative replies; ques- 
tion 2, one hundred and fifty-five negative and 
twenty-two affirmative replies; question 3, one hun- 
dred and twenty negative and fifty affirmative; and 
question 4, one hundred and thirty-four negative 
and forty-three affirmative. Besides the over- 
whelming negative vote on all these questions it is 
noticeable that while only fifty had any recollection 
of having heard any address intended to prove the 
Bible divine, forty-three remembered one intended 
to prove the contrary. This seemed to me conclu- 
sive of the necessity of keeping the antidote in cir- 
culation at least as general as the poison. And so 
since I had the pleasure of appreciative attention 
from those first addressed, I was led to hope that 
other young people and perhaps other people not 
so young might find some profit in going over this 
ground with me. 

My preface does not call for it, but I will venture 
to add that the pulpit will gain increased respect 
and power as it goes on to declare boldly what it 
believes about the Bible. In these days of special- 
ists it would seem to be assumed that preachers 



vi PEEFACE 

have no business with a belief about the Bible ex- 
cept what may be authenticated to them by the 
specialist. The preacher who yields that much 
might as well yield, in my opinion, the little that is 
left of his commission. For I cannot imagine a 
man who could preach with authority without first 
settling the question of authority. 

Perhaps I ought to say a word to the critic in 
anticipation of his verdict, should his eye chance to 
fall on these pages, that the treatment here pre- 
sented shows no acquaintance with modern Biblical 
scholarship. I am, afraid this is true. But even if 
the more mortifying charge were made that the 
author himself has no acquaintance with that great 
field of knowledge, might I not plead my audience 
in extenuation, or, might I not offer my title as a 
sufficient reason for not attempting high things? 
Divine Credentials may be illustrated by modern 
Biblical scholarship, but surely they are not de- 
pendent on it; otherwise they would never have 
been revealed unto babes. A discussion of critical 
difficulties could not have settled the main question 
one way or the other, as I viewed it. The question 
whether God has given men a revelation precedes 
both in time and in importance the question what 
that revelation is. 

T. H. Lewis. 

Western Maryland College. 



CONTENTS 

PAGi 

Introduction — The Case Stated 3 

I. — Is the Christian Student's Attitude Toward the 
Bible Scientific? 13 

II. — Is It Reasonable to Expect a Divine Book? 29 

III. — The Credential of Antiquity 47 

IV. — The Credential of Testimony 65 

V. — The Credential of Reason 87 

VI. — The Credential of Miracle 109 

VII. — The Credential of Prophecy 129 

VIII. — The Credential of Conscience 149 

IX. — The Credential of Experience 171 

X. — The Credential of Discipleship 193 

XI. — The Credential of Discernment 213 

XII. — The Credential of Jesus 233 

XIII. — The Credential of Jesus' Testimony 255 

XIV. — The Credential of Trtumph 273 



INTKODUCTION 
THE CASE STATED 



INTBODUCTION 
THE CASE STATED 

The faith of the Christian world is that God has 
given to men a written revelation of His will, and 
that He has made it possible for men to discover 
and identify this revelation amid all the literature 
of the world by certain marks which He has given it. 
This revelation we believe to be the book we call 
the Bible; and the marks by which we may know 
that the Bible is this revelation of God, we call its 
credentials. Our present purpose is to consider 
the credentials of this book to see if they support 
the claim that the Bible is a divine book. 

We must distinguish clearly just what the task 
is we have undertaken. We have not started out to 
discover any truth about God such as a revelation 
might be expected to declare. For the whole 
ground of a revelation is the assumption that man 
has not the power to discover sufficient religious 
truth to satisfy his longings. But revealing a truth 
and finding a truth that has been revealed are dif- 
ferent things. What we have to do is to find a book. 
To do this requires the same kind of powers and ef- 

3 



4 INTEODUCTION 

fort for all books, whatever their kind may be. If 
man has any ability to trace effects back to their 
causes, to identify products with their producers, 
to prove ownership or authorships — if he can do this 
in one sphere he can do it in another. So that the 
ability to prove that a certain book is divine is en- 
tirely different from the ability one may need to 
produce a divine book. Precisely the same logical 
and critical power which would enable us to deter- 
mine whether a certain book was one of Aristotle's, 
would enable us to determine whether a certain 
book was God's, provided the logical and critical 
power be limited to determining what credentials 
or marks are properly to be called Aristotelian or 
divine, and whether they belong to a certain book. 

Now we believe the Bible is God's book, not be- 
cause we have been commanded so to believe, nor be- 
cause we have had a vision to that effect, nor be- 
cause we wish to believe it; but because we have 
found the marks of God on it. We believe the 
Bible is divine because logic compels us to confess 
that its credentials are divine. 

This is all we mean by the general title of "The 
Divine Credentials." We are not begging the ques- 
tion by this title. We do not ask you to grant that 
the marks are divine that we may then prove that 
the book is divine. We only ask you to concede 
that men have the ability to discern the difference 
between a mark or credential which is divine and 
one which is not. Then we propose to take up the 



INTRODUCTION 5 

credentials of this book for examination, and if we 
settle the fact by processes of reason that they are 
divine ; and if we show by plain matter of fact that 
these credentials do attach to the Bible, we shall 
expect you to admit the conclusion that the Bible is 
also divine. 

We expect to find some of the credentials of the 
Bible just the same as those of other books so far 
as their nature is concerned, yet differing from all 
others in their degree. Others will be found differ- 
ent in their nature from the marks attaching to any 
other book whatsoever. But all, from one of these 
reasons or the other, will certify a fact which can- 
not be accounted for unless we admit that God is 
the author of the book. And the fact so certified 
by these peculiar marks is this : that the Bible is so 
different from every other book that was ever writ- 
ten that it must be placed outside the category of 
human products; it exhibits characteristics that 
cannot be accounted for by simply calculating all 
possible human forces. 

That you may follow the discussion more satis- 
factorily it will be well to take a survey of the whole 
subject, so far as this book attempts to cover it. 

The first two chapters are preparatory to the gen- 
eral discussion ; the first examining the attitude of 
the Christian student towards the Bible, to see if it 
is justly chargeable with unfair prejudice in favor 
of the claims of the Bible, or if it is as fair, as free 
from prepossessions and as fearless of consequences 



6 INTRODUCTION 

as that which, is called the scientific attitude; the 
second, endeavoring to stand in the place of those 
without the Bible to see what our notions of recti- 
tude and benevolence would lead us to conclude as 
to the likelihood that God would do what we believe 
He has done in giving men a revelation. Taking 
up then the credentials of the Bible, we begin with 
those which in their nature are the same as the cre- 
dentials of other books. The book has a history as 
a fact in the world; there was a time when it did 
not exist and when it began to be, and its existence 
to this day ties it to all that past with a history. 
Then this book is a communication of thought, has 
a mode of communicating thought, and depends on 
human faculties of thought and expression in com- 
municating this thought. Finally, the substance 
of this book must be perceived and understood and 
weighed and accepted or rejected on its merits as a 
statement of facts through the ordinary processes 
of apprehension and judgment. In these three re- 
spects this book has no marks which differ in their 
nature from those of any other book. Nevertheless, 
by reason of the vast difference in degree in which 
these marks are found here we shall claim for these 
credentials that they are divine. Accordingly, in 
the third chapter we shall consider the Credential 
of Antiquity; in the fourth, the Credential of Tes- 
timony, and in the fifth, the Credential of Reason. 
In other words, we shall claim that the history of 
this book, that the testimony making up the body 



INTRODUCTION 7 

and matter of this book, and that the facts them- 
selves as examined by reason are all so different in 
their degree from the same marks as seen in other 
books, that there is no rational way of accounting 
for them but by acknowledging them to be divine. 

The remaining chapters will deal with creden- 
tials which are not only different in degree from 
those belonging to any other book, but which have 
such a nature as entitles them to be called divine. 
They are so different from the marks any other 
book can show that many are offended at them, and 
some believers hesitate and protest at placing em- 
phasis upon them. But they are a part of the rec- 
ord and cannot be overlooked nor dealt with in a 
slighting way. They assert their own imperious 
importance. They constitute the Credential of 
Miracle, which is the subject of the sixth chapter, 
and the Credential of Prophecy, considered in the 
seventh. 

After examining the credentials which are to be 
found by inspecting the book itself, attention is di- 
rected to the results which confirm the claims of the 
Bible. It is reasonable to expect that a book of 
such a character will produce effects and be at- 
tended with circumstances commensurate with its 
character. For this reason we examine in the 
eighth chapter the Credential of Conscience, to see 
what the natural man will say in confirmation of 
the claims of the Bible. In the ninth chapter the 
testimony of the spiritual man is considered as the 



8 INTBODUCTION 

Credential of Experience, and in the tenth the Cre- 
dential of Discipleship sets forth the results of a 
study of the Bible. The eleventh chapter discusses 
the Bible's own claim as the Credential of Discern- 
ment. The twelfth sets forth the Credential of 
Jesus, the ultimate and crowning result of the 
Bible in the world as the Divine Man. The thir- 
teenth describes the Credential of Jesus' Testi- 
mony to the Bible, and the fourteenth sets forth 
some of the results of this book in human history, 
constituting the Credential of Triumph, and illus- 
trating a divine persistence as marvelous as it is 
plain. 

Such in brief outline is the way before us. It is 
not claimed that this is an original or even a new 
line of thought. These doctrines, on the contrary, 
are very old. But perhaps some of you may never 
have had them brought before you ; and even if you 
have it may not be profitless for you to review them. 
They encouraged and comforted our fathers, in an 
orthodoxy which was vital with loyalty to God and 
goodwill to men. They bred young Christians of 
the olden time into valiant soldiers of the truth and 
implacable antagonists of all unrighteousness. 
They availed to confute infidels, stop the mouths 
of blasphemers, and quench the frivolities of the 
worldling. And if we set ourselves reverently at 
the feet of these doctrines, patiently examining 
their claims and industriously brightening them by 
whatever new knowledge of facts and methods we 



INTRODUCTION 9 

may acquire, we will feel no regret that they are 
not new in our delight at finding new confidence 
pulsing through our hearts, proving that the truth 
and therefore the vigor of these doctrines is of that 
sort that waxeth not old. 

Yet while we thus freely disclaim originality and 
novelty in these doctrines, let it not be supposed 
that you will be asked to receive any doctrine sim- 
ply because it is old. On the contrary, we will 
prove all things so far as we have testing ability; 
we will endeavor to read the records candidly; 
we will examine the witnesses rigorously; we will 
weigh results impartially. But since the under- 
taking is so serious and momentous we will lay 
aside all flippancy; and in the forefront of our 
labors we will set as the warning and the motto of 
our design these weighty words: 

"Therefore toe ought to give the more earnest 
heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any 
time we should let them slip. For if the word 
spoken by angels was steadfast, and every trans- 
gression and disobedience received a just recom- 
pense of reward, hoio shall ive escape, if we neglect 
so great salvation; tchich at the first began to be 
spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us 
by them that heard Him; God also bearing them 
witness both tvith signs and toonders, and with 
divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, ac- 
cording to His own will?" — Hebrews ii, 1-4. 



IS THE CHRISTIAN STUDENT'S ATTITUDE 
TOWARD THE BIBLE SCIENTIFIC? 



"Open thou mine eyes, that I may behold won- 
drous things out of thy law." — Psalm cxix, 18. 



IS THE CHRISTIAN STUDENT S ATTITUDE TOWARD THE 
BIBLE SCIENTIFIC? 

A verse taken from the Old Testament may suit- 
ably answer the question of this chapter. 

This verse sets forth the motive of the whole 
psalm from which it is taken. The longest and 
the most elaborate of all the psalms, it is the least 
varied in its theme. It is wholly taken up with 
devout exclamations of wonder and reverent as- 
piration toward a fuller knowledge of the trans- 
cendent beauties of God's law. It is the fullest 
and the most specific expression of the attitude of 
God's people toward God's book. 

Shall we adopt this expression? Are we ready 
to place this verse taken from the Old Covenant 
and the old civilization in front of our faith, and 
submit it to the light and questioning of the schol- 
arship of the present day? Is this verse adequate 
and exact as an expression of the Christian stu- 
dent's attitude toward the Bible? To such ques- 
tions we answer without hesitation, "yes"; and to 
the charge that such an attitude tends to limit and 

13 



14 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

perhaps stifle free inquiry; that one who regards 
the Bible in this way has already decided the ques- 
tion as to its character before investigation, the 
following remarks are intended as a reply. 

The question of attitude meets us on the 
threshold of every study, and is of such primary im- 
portance that nothing can be satisfactorily accom- 
plished until this is settled. When we enter upon 
the study of one of the sciences we are told that 
the first thing to do is to free ourselves of all pre- 
possessions. We must not allow ourselves to ex- 
pect one result rather than another. We must not 
suppose this rather than that to be true, much less 
must we indulge the least wish that this rather than 
that should be true. Nothing must be taken for 
granted; we must only watch closely and report 
faithfully what we observe. Only thus, coming with 
a free, an unbiased mind, can we hope to get at the 
real, uncolored truth. 

There are those who contend that the difference 
between the scientific and the Christian student is 
exactly this : that the latter comes to the Bible with 
prepossessions in its favor and is therefore unable 
to conduct a perfectly fair investigation of its 
claims. He already believes the Bible to be divine 
before he investigates. But this doubtless arises 
from a misunderstanding or a confusion of ideas. 
It must be admitted that absolute freedom from 
prepossessions is impossible to any man who is not 
absolutely ignorant. A fair man will enter upon 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 15 

an investigation with the determination not to al- 
low any personal preferences to influence his judg- 
ment. He will watch himself, calculate his pre- 
possessions and subtract their effect from the re- 
sult. But further than this it is idle to talk of go- 
ing. It is idle for a Christian man to say that for 
the purposes of investigation he will lay aside his 
belief. As well offer to separate himself from him- 
self. 

On the other hand, it must be remembered that 
much of what is called unbelief is quite as dog- 
matic, if not prejudiced, as the most positive belief. 
And if it is unscientific to say, in advance of any 
investigation, that the Bible is a divine book, it is 
certainly no less unscientific to say, in advance of 
any investigation, that the Bible is not a divine 
book. Indeed, the average belief about the Bible is 
less positive than the average unbelief. To believe 
in it means, in many cases, to follow the lines of 
thought and feeling of least resistance. While to 
reject it means, in a Christian land certainly, a 
wrench of both thought and feeling that would in- 
dicate a very positive state of mind. In view of 
this it would be fair to say, that if the proofs for 
and against the Bible were equal, it would be easier 
to overcome the believer's prejudices than the un- 
believer's. But at least it would be unreasonable 
to demand more of an intelligent inquirer, whether 
he be a believer or a skeptic, than a willingness to 
look at the facts as they are and to follow where 



16 DIVINE (CREDENTIALS 

they may lead. This much we belieye every Chris- 
tian is able and willing to do. All the teachings 
of his faith counsel and strengthen him to do this. 
And more than this he does not ask of any antago- 
nist. He is willing to rest the claims of the Bible 
on the challenge of the Bible itself, "Come now, and 
let us reason together." 

1. The believer's attitude toward the Bible is de- 
scribed as an attitude of prayer, "Open thou mine 
eyes." This is a stone of stumbling to the unbe- 
liever. He regards such an attitude as fatal to all 
claims to scientific investigation. But a patient 
consideration of the matter will show that the ob- 
jection is not well taken. This is a prayer, to be 
sure; but it is the prayer of an investigator. When 
he asks that his eyes may be opened it is not that 
he would be spared labor or pains ; or that results 
might be given him in some miraculous way. He 
is simply asking for the best use of his powers. 
Eecognizing that he has eyes, and that these were 
given him for use, he only asks the privilege and 
opportunity of using them to the best advantage 
and to their full power. Surely this ought not to 
be called unscientific. This is not begging the 
question, nor putting prayer in the place of work. 
It is uniform with the thought and aspiration ac- 
companying all work done at our best. Just as the 
athlete might desire the very best condition of 
muscle and nerve for the contest; or the surgeon 
the most steady and skilful use of hand and eye for 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 17 

a critical operation; or the astronomer a clear, 
penetrating vision; or the philosopher an uncloud- 
ed, mind; so the Christian investigator desires 
that his faculties for investigation may be awak- 
ened to their full strength and may work with 
unimpaired vigor. And whether one prays to 
Jehovah or Jove or Buddha ; or if he simply makes 
an inward reflection and concentration of purpose, 
the principle in all is still the same. It is a con- 
fession of the truth that to approach any great or 
serious subject without this girding up of the men- 
tal loins is unscientific and unworthy of a rational 
being. 

You have read of the great novelist who was ac- 
customed to shut himself up for weeks to write one 
of his stories; how he denied himself to friends; 
scarcely tasted food, and lived and wrestled and 
suffered in the world he was creating until he came 
out pale and haggard at last as if from an illness. 
You know the story of the great poet, struck silent 
by the death of his friend, who wrought out in the 
seclusion of twenty years his immortal garland, the 
grandest offering ever made to friendship in human 
verse. You know what has led to the great discov- 
eries in science, to the marvelous inventions, to all 
the great results in modern civilization. It was 
the same secret in all ; some mind girding itself be- 
fore a great thought and cheerfully entering upon 
days and years of patient toil to grasp and inter- 
pret it. 



18 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

And this subject before us, is it not a great sub- 
ject? Whether true or false, its very conception 
is the greatest conceivable. It offers to reveal to 
us the greatest of beings, to explain to us the great- 
est of mysteries, to give to us the greatest of conso- 
lations. Its history is great, its philosophy is 
great, its moral principles are great. True or 
false, I say, from beginning to end there is nothing 
insignificant in it. And is it not likewise a serious 
subject? It is possible there is no God; but surely 
the question whether there is, is one of the most se- 
rious as well as the greatest man can contemplate. 
It is possible there is a God, but He has never 
spoken to men ; but to learn whether He has spoken 
is serious employment for the loftiest energies of 
the mind. And what can be more serious to us in 
the nearness of personal concern, in the vast sweep 
of possible results, than the great question of des- 
tiny and responsibility; subjects which this book 
proposes to give clear and complete information 
upon ; to speak by authority about, nay, to give us 
the only satisfactory information ever offered to 
us? 

And what shall be thought, in view of these 
facts, of that shallow, flippant criticism which says., 
without reading the book itself, and in disdain of 
the labors of those who have devoted their lives to 
the study of the book, "I don't believe in the Bible"? 
What shall be thought of that more sober criticism 
which, under the name of scientific investigation, 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 19 

begins its labors with tlie assumption that the Bible 
is just like any other book ; and that whatever in it 
is found unlike other books is false? What shall 
be thought of that more prevalent skepticism, which 
we never hear derided as unscientific, but yet which 
sprouts, buds, blossoms and brings forth its com- 
plete crop in one night under the glaring lights of a 
theatre and the heated rhetoric of an infidel lec- 
turer? One night, or rather one hour of one night, 
devoted to this sort of investigation, and henceforth 
a Biblical critic ! A study which has engaged the 
loftiest exertions of minds recognized in all ages as 
supremely great ; a study to which nothing but the 
most serious and prolonged consideration has ever 
been given by any mind the world has been willing 
to recognize as great ; a study which to the vast ma- 
jority of those attending to it has issued in worship- 
ful homage to all its claims — this is the study 
which demands at our hands, not the sneer, nor the 
flippant folly of an hour, nor the smart wit of the 
buffoon ; but the consecration of all we have that 
makes us men and distinguishes us from those with- 
out reason. It is a study to be entered upon in the 
fear of God; and when one utters his high resolu- 
tion in the form of a prayer, the best he knows to 
the holiest he knows, he is strictly within the limits 
and requirements of the most rigid science; he is 
undertaking a great work in great fear. 

2. Another feature of the Psalmist's attitude 
must be noticed. It is not simply a general state of 



20 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

aspiration, but a particular object is aimed at in 
this prayer: "that I may behold wondrous things 
out of thy law." It is this especially which the 
critic condemns as unscientific. For here, they de- 
clare, is a frank confession that the investigator 
does not approach his subject without preposses- 
sion. He anticipates already the result of his in- 
vestigation ; he expects to see wondrous things, and 
he prays for perception to see what his unaided 
powers might miss, but what he must see by what- 
ever means. And so, they say, all believers ap- 
proach the Bible. They expect it to be wonderful 
and they want it to be wonderful before they begin 
their investigation ; and this prepossession vitiates 
all their labor and renders the result untrust- 
worthy. The scientific spirit would approach such 
an investigation not expecting anything and not 
desiring anything. It would not declare the Bible 
to be untrue, it would not declare it to be true. It 
would not wish it to be found either true or untrue. 
It would simply wait; look at it in the cold, dry 
light of reason, and note what it saw. 

I have been particular and fair, I trust, in stating 
this objection for two reasons. First, it is appar- 
ently so forcible and so easy to come at, that it 
forms the groundwork of almost all the skepticism 
that takes popular form and appeals to young 
minds. It is the idea that if once a man frees him- 
self from the associations of early life and casts off 
traditions and becomes an independent thinker he 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 21 

will be in no more bondage to the Bible than to any 
other book. And, accordingly, the only men who 
hold on to the Bible are prejudiced men who have 
not yet got away from superstition. I do not wish 
you to entertain the slightest suspicion that I would 
evade a challenge like this, and so I have set it out 
in full, confident that you will see how superficial 
it is. My second reason for dwelling on this objec- 
tion is that so far from evading it or trying to ex- 
plain it away, I really believe that the issue should 
be joined right here, and that we ought to insist 
that this anticipation and desire of the believer are 
not only allowable, but that they constitute the only 
scientific attitude of an investigator, either of the 
claims of the Bible or of any other sphere of knowl- 
edge whatsoever. 

You have all heard something of the philosophic 
or scientific imagination. You have been taught 
that so far from imagination being restricted to the 
poet and the orator and the musician and the paint- 
er, it is an essential element in all productive study- 
Without it we would be no better than moles bur 
rowing our way under ground without direction 
and without progress. You have been accustomed 
to the idea that even the mathematician, the man of 
dry, hard facts, so far removed in popular fancy 
from any use of the imagination, can do nothing 
without it, and is all the time asking you to use 
your imagination to see things that are not there. 
Whoever saw a mathematical point or line; and 



22 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

what painful exercise it is to some minds to think 
of a thing without length or breadth? And the 
physicist, who is supposed to weigh everything and 
measure everything, taking nothing for granted. 
And the chemist, who puts down nothing in his note 
book till he sees it in his retort. Both these make 
quite as heavy a demand on your imagination as 
any Biblical scholar would dare to make. They 
ask you to think of an atom, which nobody has seen 
or can see; which, in fact, cannot be, and which 
must yet be imagined before any science of physics 
or chemistry is possible. Take the inventor, the 
man looking only for more wheels and springs or 
better combinations of these; what can he do until 
he first sees something, a thing no one has ever 
seen, but which he sees before he brings it into ex- 
istence? Wherever we turn it is the same. No 
new results have ever been achieved without the 
use of this sort of imagination. 

Now what is this but the anticipation of a result? 
the opening of the eyes to see what other men do 
not see? All science begins its investigation with 
a hypothesis, which is nothing after all but a guess, 
a universal use of the imagination, or, in other 
words, an anticipation. You cannot move forward 
in a straight line in the mental world any more 
than you can plough a straight furrow without 
looking at something ahead of you. 

We may make the same claim with reference to 
what is objected to here as the Psalmist's desire. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 23 

Sympathetic feeling is an element of critical ability 
no less than intellectual apprehension. The man 
who has no sympathy with art will give us no val- 
uable instruction for judging a picture. The man 
who has never felt the glow of patriotism might 
write down the events of Washington's life, but 
how could he, in any true sense, give us a life of 
Washington? "And so," says Professor Fisher, 
"an irreligious critic will never get through the 
shell of the Bible. The qualities which are requi- 
site in a critic of the Bible are parallel with such as 
everybody thinks essential in poetry, in the fine arts 
generally, in every department where something is 
required beyond mere keenness and information." 
Tested by these canons it cannot be shown that the 
man whose attitude towards the Bible is described 
by the Psalmist is unscientific. He does have an- 
ticipations; he does not claim to be without inter- 
est in the result of his investigations ; but he has no 
prepossessions nor prejudices that unfit him for 
judging fairly. His anticipation and desire are 
that when his eyes are opened he will see wondrous 
things in this Bible. 

Call this an assumption if you will, but it is an 
assumption only ignorance or prejudice could re- 
fuse to make. For how can we deny or fail to see 
that this is a wonderful book? If it is false, it is 
the most wonderful falsehood that ever was uttered 
on this earth. And if it is true, the wonder is over- 
whelming, for it is the word of Almighty God. We 



24 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

did not give it this character of "wonderful," nor 
is it in anywise dependent upon our regard. 
Whether we believe or deny, it still remains won- 
derful. Here it is, hoary with the centuries, bap- 
tized with the tears and blood of saints, naming 
with the scintillating fires of a thousand marvels, 
literary, moral, spiritual. Mere paper and ink, it yet 
speaks with the tongue of all time and of all place. 
It is the oldest book and yet the one mostly widely 
read to-day. It is the simplest book, yet a thousand 
libraries have grown out of it. It seems to be noth- 
ing more than a miscellaneous collection of tracts, 
widely separated in time and style, yet open it any- 
where and you find the same theme. It is the most 
thoroughly human book ; more personal to the busi- 
ness man than his ledgers, to the student than his 
text-books, to the man of leisure than his diaries; 
yet at the same time it is so far removed above hu- 
man thought that no mortal has ever claimed to be 
in any true sense its author. Wonderful Book ! 

And shall we stand in critical scorn of the man 
who rises to the apprehension of this wonder and 
cries out for help to see it clearly? Is this the man 
we should stigmatize as unscientific? Bather let 
us keep that term for the man who, in the effort to 
free himself from assumptions, starts with an as- 
sumption that boldly ignores history and denies 
the evidences of his senses by saying that the Bible 
is just like any other book. This is neither science 
nor common sense. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 25 

No, we will not allow ourselves to be so bound by 
our belief as to make us impatient to hear, or un- 
fair to judge all the evidence to be produced; and 
we will render our verdict in the fear of that very 
belief which commands us to be just and true. But 
neither will we stultify ourselves by attempting to 
assume that no assumptions are to be made in ref- 
erence to this book. We will not play at impossi- 
bilities. And although we must be careful not to 
put these assumptions in the place of proof, nor to 
make them an excuse for not engaging in the pro- 
longed effort of proof ; yet we will begin our inves- 
tigation with the reasonable, the scientific assump- 
tion and anticipation that when our eyes are opened 
we shall behold wondrous things out of this law. 
With open minds, with fearlessness as to conse- 
quences, we will yet treat reverently what time, if 
nothing else, has consecrated; we will behave our- 
selves as those who are privileged to be in the com- 
pany of the great, who stand before kings; and we 
will order our thoughts and our speech as becomes 
those who muse on loftiest themes. 

In this spirit we shall claim kinship with all true 
scientists and move to the measure of all who rever- 
ently seek after knowledge. We do not want to 
invent knowledge, but neither do we want to miss 
it; and so our minds shall be receptive but discrim- 
inating, eager but reverent. We will not cease to 
pursue the truth wherever it may lead, but neither 
will we forget that we follow on to know the Lord. 



26 DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 

The light of the knowledge of His glory shall not 
blind us to our duty to our reason, but neither will 
we perversely shut our eyes to escape its brilliancy 
and then contend that there is no light. We will 
pray, and we will rejoice to believe that our prayer 
may be answered, that our eyes may be opened and 
that we may see wondrous things out of this law. 



II 



IS IT SEASONABLE TO EXPECT A DIVINE 
BOOK? 



"Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence." 
-Psalm 1, 3. 



II 

IS IT REASONABLE TO EXPECT A DIVINE BOOK? 

The question we have started out to investigate 
is whether there is sufficient proof to establish the 
fact that God has spoken to men and through men, 
and that we have the record of this speech in the 
Bible. We propose to postpone that question long 
enough to inquire what reasons there are for sup- 
posing such a fact might occur, or could be proved 
if it did occur. In other words, what ground is 
there for the confidence of one who stands looking 
forward to the possibilities of a revelation and de- 
clares, "Our God shall come, and shall not keep 
silence"? 

It may seem a waste of time to stop to consider 
what might be if we have direct proof of what is. 
And to the believer such considerations have small 
value. But many men are indisposed to consider 
the direct evidences offered to prove that a revela- 
tion from God has been given, because they have 
settled the matter beforehand that such a thing is 
impossible. We wish to show that such a conclu- 
sion, so far from being the product of reason as is 

29 



30 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

proudly claimed, is in fact arbitrary, the product 
of prejudice and without any support in reason. 
We think it can be shown that all the facts having 
any connection with the subject furnish reasonable 
ground for expecting such a revelation as the Bible 
claims to be. 

The considerations that support such an expec- 
tation we call the presumptive evidences of revela- 
tion ; and a few words in explanation of this phrase 
will be in place here before bringing forward these 
presumptive evidences. 

Suppose, for example, to show the affirmative 
value of presumptive evidence, in attempting to 
prove a declaration by a witness you show that the 
witness was near enough to have heard the declara- 
tion if one had been made; that he was intelligent 
enough to have comprehended it; and that he had 
no personal interest in the declaration to have in- 
duced him to invent it. You have not proved the 
declaration by these steps, to be sure, but you have 
prepared the way for the jury to give favorable con- 
sideration to what the witness may testify to. This 
is what we claim the presumptive evidences in sup- 
port of revelation force every reasonable man to do. 

Presumptive evidence has also a negative value, 
and it is generally used with greater force to de- 
stroy a theory set up by bringing forward some fact 
that contradicts the theory and makes belief in it 
impossible. Thus, in a famous will case, two papers 
are produced, both claiming to be the last will of 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 31 

the testator. Both are in due form and equally 
well attested by witnesses. One of these wills, 
however, is discovered to have been written on 
paper bearing the water mark of a firm that did not 
begin business until after the date of the will. This 
fact is of slight affirmative value in establishing the 
genuineness of the other paper, but it completely 
demolishes the claim of this paper to be the true 
will, because to believe that would be to believe 
that a man could sign a will after he was dead. 

The strength of presumptive evidence consists in 
the reasonableness of the demand that one who of» 
fers to prove anything must show that he has a be- 
lievable case after it is proved. It is therefore al- 
lowable to show in advance of direct proof that cer- 
tain well known facts support his theory and are 
consistent with a belief in his case; or his opponent 
may throw him out of court before direct testimony 
can be offered by showing that the theory advanced 
is unbelievable no matter how much testimony may 
support it. 

The man who believes that the Bible is a divine 
revelation undertakes to meet both these phases of 
presumptive evidence. First, by showing that no 
fact has been or can be submitted making this an 
unbelievable case. And, secondly, by bringing for- 
ward certain facts which are not only consistent 
with his case, but are so well established and so in- 
timately connected with his case that it is impossi- 
ble to admit them or to give a reasonable and sat- 



32 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

isfactory explanation of them without admitting 
that what he claims is reasonable and may be 
proved. This is the extent of what is undertaken 
in this chapter, and this is what we mean by saying 
that it is reasonable to expect a divine book. Stand- 
ing upon these antecedent facts and considering 
their legitimate connections we have boldness to 
declare, "Our God shall come;, and shall not keep 
silence." 

1. It will not do much, but we want to begin at 
the very threshold of faith, and it may serve to 
clear up a false and superficial notion entertained 
in some quarters to-day, to ask whether any man 
has shown, or whether it is imagined any man can 
show, that the idea of a divine revelation contra- 
dicts reason and so is unbelievable? I ask not 
whether the fact of a divine revelation has been 
proved, or can be proved ; but supposing it could be 
proved, could it be believed? 

When you say a thing contradicts reason you may 
mean reason founded on experience; as, for in- 
stance, to say that the sun will not rise to-morrow 
contradicts reason, but yet it is not impossible to 
believe this, and in fact you expect that some day 
this very thing will happen. To refuse to believe 
that which contradicts our experience, if held as a 
principle, would shut us out from all intellectual 
progress. Man goes forward to new things by 
turning his back on the old. A revelation from 
God is not unbelievable, therefore, simply because 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 33 

it comes into our experience as a new thing, or even 
if it comes as a thing totally different from all we 
have experienced. 

But we may mean by reason the faculty of appre- 
hending and judging things in consciousness; and 
then to say that a thing contradicts reason means 
that it cannot be believed. No amount of proof can 
convince us that a part is as great as a whole, or 
that the object we hold in our hand does not exist. 
In such a case we reject the conclusion, not because 
it is new in our experience, but because we see it is 
impossible to put it into our experience. Now I 
undertake to rest the whole case here. If any man 
can show that it is contrary to reason in the sense 
just described to believe that God has made a writ- 
ten revelation of his will; that to believe it a man 
must deny the evidence of his senses or of his con- 
sciousness, then, of course, all further discussion 
is useless and absurd. There are those who affirm 
this. But they support their claim, not by appeal- 
ing to the common and universal consciousness of 
mankind, but by asserting that as a revelation must 
be supernatural and as the supernatural is con- 
fessedly beyond nature, a man must contradict na- 
ture to believe in the supernatural. 

Now you observe that this is not saying that a 
supernatural revelation does in fact contradict the 
common and universal consciousness of mankind, 
but that in the opinion of the skeptic it ought to. 
A contradiction of nature needs no antagonist. If 



34 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

all the scholars in the world should declare that a 
part is as great as a whole and not one skeptic as- 
sailed or denied it you would be as far from believ- 
ing it as you are now. But the great, the over- 
whelming majority of those to whom it has been 
presented have always and readily believed in a 
supernatural revelation. Why have they believed 
if it contradicted reason? If it contradicts univer- 
sal reason why does not universal reason find it 
out? It would seem indeed that they contradict 
reason who insist that a supernatural revelation is 
unbelievable. At least they contradict the almost 
universal experience. 

But what ground is there for saying even that a 
supernatural revelation ought to contradict reason? 
There is no ground in consciousness or we would 
not believe such a revelation. The skeptic has to 
tell us why it contradicts reason. And the sum of 
his explanation is that whatever is unexplainable 
is unbelievable. But on this ground we must give 
up consciousness itself ; for there is no rational ex- 
planation of consciousness. No man can explain 
what it is, whence it comes, how it persists, nor 
whither it goes. We ought therefore to refuse to 
believe it exists. And this is what the thoroughgo- 
ing rationalist is prepared to do. Ziehen concludes 
his psychology with these words: "The investiga- 
tion of the so-called voluntary processes has given 
us no grounds whatever for the assumption of an- 
other psychical 'something' in addition to the series 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 35 

of sensations and ideas. The metaphysician can 
perhaps arrive at the theoretical fiction of a being 
which is the subject of the sensations, ideas and ac- 
tions, and may name this subject ego or soul. 
Physiological Psychology, however, cannot exceed 
the bounds of its empirical data." 

Now we do not know how God can communicate 
his will to man, any more than we know how one 
man's words can be translated into ideas in an- 
other man's consciousness. But this is a different 
thing from saying that neither is believable. No 
man has shown that both of these are not facts, and 
I expect your admission that no man can show it. 
But reflect how significant such an admission is. 
This divine revelation contradicts man at almost 
every point; contradicts his experience, his wishes, 
his methods, his ideals; is such a persistent witness 
against him that he would be willing to give his 
whole estate to successfully set it aside. Yet here 
it is still in court because no man can impeach its 
believableness. This is not much to say for it, you 
may think. But it is enough for this. I appeal to 
you if it does not render contemptible the air of 
superiority some men assume in talking about the 
Bible ; as when they say it is really too much to ex- 
pect of an educated man that he should give serious 
consideration to such claims as the Bible makes. If 
the fact of a divine revelation is preposterous let 
us have the facts that render it so. What element 
of consciousness does it contradict? What is it 



36 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

opposed to, indeed, but the fancies and wishes of 
the man who says in his heart, "There is no God"? 

2. Now let us advance to the consideration of 
some of the positive or affirmative presumptions 
which incline us to give favorable attention to the 
claim of the Bible to be God's book. This will not 
be assuming anything. It is to be remembered that 
a presumption is a very different thing from an as- 
sumption. An assumption simply says, "Let us be- 
lieve so and so-." But a presumption says, "Here 
are certain facts we know to be true. Since these 
are true it looks reasonable to believe so and so, be- 
cause of its connection with the facts we know to 
be true." 

There are three classes of facts we propose to 
consider. They are facts accepted by all without 
reference to what the Bible teaches, and may be 
learned from sources independent of the Bible. Our 
contention is that a knowledge of these facts forces 
us to go on to admit that if we added to them as an- 
other fact the divine authority of the Bible, the 
whole group of facts would still be consistent. 
More than this, that these facts are rationally ex- 
plained by adding to them this other fact, and that 
without this addition they leave us with serious 
problems unexplained. Therefore the presumption 
is that this other fact ought to be added and the 
Bible called God's book. 

(a). There are, first, the facts we know about 
God. Suppose we shut the Bible and read simply 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 37 

the book of nature. I do not doubt you will admit 
that we are compelled to think this orderly and 
useful arrangement of matter and forces about us is 
the work of an intelligent Being we ought to call 
God ; that we are compelled to think God also made 
us and not we ourselves; that we are compelled to 
feel ourselves dependent on his power, and in a 
most real sense under his government; so that we 
cannot go away from him in any direction without 
meeting the constraint of law and the pain of pen- 
alty ; that we are compelled to believe, nevertheless, 
that the benevolent purposes of this Being are, on 
the whole, clearly apparent, so that it seems nowise 
uncertain to us that the arrangement of our duty 
with law and penalty is adjusted to a scheme work- 
ing out our best interests ; and finally that this in- 
telligent, benevolent Being makes it a part of his 
scheme of government to make known to us what 
that scheme is and how we may best fulfill our part 
in it. 

On these facts we raise this presumption ; that if 
God could he would give us the information de- 
signed for us in the clearest and most explicit form 
of revelation, a written book. 

Now to deny that God is such a Being that he 
could make a written revelation is practically to 
deny that there is a God. We have by common 
consent put into that name the idea of a limitless 
Being, and to limit his power is to make his nature 
contradict his name. The statement is therefore 



38 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

modified so as to say that the impossibility of a 
written revelation lies in the limited capacity of 
man, on account of which God himself is also limit- 
ed so far as this revelation goes. God might speak, 
but if he should man could not hear. 

This argument from man's limitations supposes 
a radical difference between man's thoughts and 
God's which we have no right to suppose. The only 
difference we know anything about is a difference 
of degree. Why should we doubt our ability to 
think God's thoughts as well as man's? When we 
cannot look out upon inanimate nature without a 
movement of soul in intelligent impulses; when the 
meanest flower can whisper psalms of beauty to us ; 
when the silent stars have yet a voice that goes out 
to the ends of the world and makes solitude vocal 
with praises of God; when these, which are but 
parts of his ways, the mere hidings of his power, 
thrill us with the consciousness of his presence and 
the glory of his counsels ; why should we hesitate to 
believe that we can also hear that same voice when 
it speaks to us from heaven in the written word? 
Has he, who can convey so much to us by these 
mere wrappings of thought, no method by which he 
can pierce through them and bring his Spirit in im- 
mediate contact with ours? Surely we are taking 
very modest ground when we think that what we 
know of God entitles us to presume that there is 
much more to know, and that he will teach us of his 
ways. The statement is found in the Bible, but it 



DIVINE CKEDENTIALS 39 

is also found among the fundamental convictions of 
every mind. We have not proved it, but it clings to 
us as though it were an instinct rather than a rea- 
sonable presumption to say, "Our God shall come 
and shall not keep silence." 

(5). We have next to consider the facts we 
know of ourselves that we may see how these raise 
a presumption of the same sort. I have just re- 
ferred to one of these facts in showing that man has 
the power to think God's thoughts ; that what God 
is pleased to write in nature or in books, man may 
in some degree understand. But more than this is 
to be said. There are some thoughts which we uni- 
versally recognize as God's thoughts and which man 
is obliged by the law of his nature to think. It is 
not a matter of choice, for instance, whether men 
will think of the difference between right and 
wrong; whether they will consider the obligation 
attached to certain perceptions; whether they will 
think upon the method by which wrongdoing may 
be made right ; whether they will think upon death 
and what comes after. These thoughts men are 
forced to think and they are all God's thoughts. In 
other words, they are thoughts which come into our 
minds because we cannot help connecting ourselves 
with a Governor of the universe. Sometimes we 
think of revelation as introducing us into a totally 
new world of thought. But the fact is the great 
subjects in the Bible are as old as creation. You 
cannot go anywhere in the world to-day without 



40 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

finding men thinking on the very subjects of which 
revelation treats. There is not one new theme in 
all this Bible; they are themes of which all men 
have always thought and must always think. What 
is new in revelation is the information it offers on 
these old themes. It gives man the newest and most 
blessed tidings about the possibility of escape from 
sin, but man has always been thinking about escape 
from sin. It points out the way, illuminated with 
the splendors of Christ's resurrection, to the life be- 
yond, bringing life and immortality to light; but 
man has always been thinking about eternal life. 
The Bible in fact is a revelation of news, not of 
topics. 

What do such facts suggest? Revelation may or 
may not be susceptible of proof, but if one should 
be given, and if it should prove to be a revelation 
of precisely such thoughts as are already in men's 
minds, only carrying on their broken and disor- 
dered thoughts to a consistent and glorious conclu- 
sion, what could be more natural or reasonable or 
better adapted to man's condition? Is it not a fair 
presumption based on the facts of our own nature 
to say of the Bible that it is such a revelation as 
might have been expected? Everywhere in this 
world to-day men are thinking on these themes. 
Everywhere except among the most highly culti- 
vated nations of the earth men are looking for in- 
formation on these themes. And these no longer 
look because they have found; because God has 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 41 

spoken to them in his word and their questioning 
minds are at rest ; because their God has come and 
has not kept silence. 

(c) But we may advance still another step and 
consider the fact that the utmost stretch of man's 
unaided knowledge has always been short of a sat- 
isfactory solution of problems that are his constant 
distress until they are solved. This furnishes such 
a presumption in favor of a revelation which does 
complete all this knowledge that we may say that 
such a revelation is necessary. Of course we must 
not say that God will do a thing because it seems 
to us necessary. This would be to make us judges 
of God. But that is not what we say. We know 
these facts about our knowledge; and we have in 
our hands a book claiming to be from God which 
completes all that is imperfect in our knowledge. 
Looking at the book and then at the facts we say 
God gave this book because it was necessary to give 
it. In this way the facts become the necessary pre- 
sumption in favor of the claims of the book. 

Men object to revelation by a book that it is un- 
necessary, that whatever God has to say to men he 
has said in creation or is saying in Providence, and 
that such an extraordinary method as a revelation 
by writing is superfluous and unbecoming. Paley's 
acute reply to this objection is, "I deem it unneces- 
sary to prove that mankind stood in need of a rev- 
elation, because I have met with no serious person 
who thinks that even under the Christian revelation 



42 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

we have too much, light, or any assurance which is 
superfluous." It is no objection to a written revel- 
ation to say that God speaks to us in Nature and in 
Providence. We gladly and reverently listen to 
God's voice wherever we hear it. We who believe 
in a Holy Bible believe also in a Holy Providence. 
To us Nature is holy, for it declares the glory of 
God. History is holy, for we believe this is the gar- 
ment God is weaving for himself in the great loom 
of time. We rejoice that the whole earth is full of 
his glory. "Day unto day uttereth speech and night 
unto night sheweth knowledge." But it is not of 
these, but only of "The Law of the Lord," that any 
one has dared to say it is perfect. There must al- 
ways be presumption of further revelation from a 
perfect Being until that comes which is perfect 
even as he is perfect ; until that comes which clasps 
all men in all the ranges of their thought in the em- 
brace of complete content. 

If men can be perfectly instructed in religious 
truths or even in moral truths without the Bible, 
why is it that they have everywhere dropped their 
learning when the Bible has been offered them? 
Why is it that the wisdom of the ages seems to the 
least in the kingdom of heaven but the fancies of a 
wandering mind? Why is it that Plato could not 
tell whether there were more gods than one; and 
that Cicero could not certainly say there was a fu- 
ture life? These men and their associates have 
taught us much and we are still learning from 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 43 

them. But what would be thought of the man who 
would seriously propose to make them our teachers 
in religion or morality? Moreover, how long is it 
to take men to read this Bible of Nature? The 
years have passed into centuries and the centuries 
into millenniums while these volumes of natural re- 
ligion have been unrolling their wisdom before all 
men. There has been no discrimination in favor of 
a special people. "There is no speech nor lan- 
guage where their voice is not heard." But still 
the millions do not read or reading do not under- 
stand. The heavens that bent in unsyllabled wis- 
dom over David sent forth their line to the end of 
the world, and still they carried no message of 
God's highest glory and they left men as they found 
them, without hope. 

Can this be the final revelation of the infinite and 
perfect God? Must we believe that he has nothing 
more to say, or that he has exhausted his resources 
of expression ? Nay, even if no written word were 
known, the very imperfection of this revelation in 
Nature would argue some better thing for us. And 
when we are told of a further revelation claiming to 
be from God; when that better thing is actually 
shedding its perfect light upon us and whispering 
its perfect music to us, what shall we say but that 
this is the glorious answer to our hope, the triumph- 
ant verification of our presumption, "Our God has 
come and has not kept silence," even as we said? 



Ill 

THE CREDENTIAL OF ANTIQUITY 



"God, who at sundry times and in divers man- 
ners spake in time past unto the fathers by the 
prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by 
his Son." — Hebrews i, 1. 



Ill 

THE CREDENTIAL OF ANTIQUITY 

We have set forth what we conceive to be the 
true attitude of one about to enter upon an inves- 
tigation of the claims of the Bible. We have also 
shown that the claim that the Bible is a divine book 
is not unbelievable on account of any contradiction 
of reason; and we have brought forward certain 
facts pertaining to God, to man, and to human 
knowledge upon which a reasonable presumption 
may be based that such a book as the Bible claims 
to be might be expected to be given to men. We 
now come to the consideration of the evidence that 
gives positive support to this claim. 

The particular method of presenting this evi- 
dence is intimated in the title: "The Divine Cre- 
dentials of the Bible." By this we design to ex- 
press our conviction that the Bible bears its evi- 
dence on its face ; that it is self- witnessing ; that it 
brings with it credentials which confirm its claims. 
Hence we shall be occupied mainly with the exami- 
nation of what the Bible says of itself. 

If there are those who feel that such proof could 
not have independent value, and that because the 

47 



48 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

divine character of the Bible is the question in dis- 
pute we must rule out the testimony of the Bible 
itself, I refer them to the answer Jesus gave the 
Jews who made a precisely similar objection : "The 
Pharisees therefore said unto him, Thou bearest 
record of thyself; thy record is not true. Jesus 
answered and said unto them, Though I bear record 
of myself, yet my record is true; for I know whence 
I came and whither I go ; but ye cannot tell whence 
I come and whither I go." When a perfectly new 
truth comes to our minds it must bear witness of 
itself, for if it received direct testimony from an- 
other truth it would not be new. The fact that God 
makes a revelation makes it necessary for it to be 
self-witnessing, for what could directly prove a 
statement to be a divine revelation but a divine 
revelation? "Light," says Augustine, "which 
brings other things to view brings itself to view. 
Light furnishes its own testimony, it opens health- 
ful eyes, and itself is a witness to itself." There 
are many and varied confirmatory proofs of the 
claims of the Bible and we shall not overlook these. 
But the true starting point of our examination 
must be the Bible itself. 

The credential to be now considered is the Cre- 
dential of Antiquity. By this we mean that the 
Bible claims to be a genuine product of the age and 
of the men referred to, a contemporary record of the 
events chronicled. If the assertion is true, that 
God did in fact speak in times past by the prophets 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 49 

at different periods of time and in separate portions 
of revelation; and if he is the same who finally 
spoke to us through his Son, then we might expect 
to verify this assertion, 

(1) By tracing the history of the Bible back 
from the present until we find it in the hands of the 
men who wrote it. This will permit us to add the 
character of the writers to what they wrote. 

(2) By showing that indisputable ground of 
historical fact is beneath these historical records. 
This will make revelation a natural part of the his- 
tory of the world and not a mere violent interven- 
tion. 

(3) By showing that this antiquity is not only 
traceable in books and in facts, but that it is an 
organized and continuous antiquity, having as its 
clearly defined and intelligent purpose to secure 
for us a continuous record of revelation through 
an unbroken series of clearly marked periods until 
the end was reached, because there was nothing 
more to reveal. If these things shall be established 
I expect this point to be gained: that as contem- 
poraneous records are the strongest possible testi- 
mony to the facts of antiquity, and in most cases 
the only direct testimony, we must either accept 
these records as genuine or give up all faith in his- 
tory. And if we accept these records as genuine 
history we shall then have contemporary and con- 
tinuous accounts of facts which we have no way of 
disproving or rejecting except by mere arbitrary 



50 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

unbelief. And if the facts are accepted as true it 
will be universally acknowledged that they are suf- 
ficient to establish all that is claimed for the Bible 
as a divine book. We shall be occupied in this 
chapter, then, with what lawyers would call tracing 
a title. But a striking difference is to be noted. 
If we go into court to prove a title we have recourse 
to certain records where the State has caused to be 
preserved the various transactions by which the 
property has passed from one possessor to another 
all most exactly described and dated. It must not 
be supposed that anything of this sort can be found 
in connection with Scripture. It might, indeed, be 
thought that if we had such a record where every 
book of Scripture was carefully described and ex- 
actly dated the evidence would be much more sat- 
isfactory. But it would surely be exactly the state 
of things the critics would fasten upon to prove con- 
clusively a conspiracy to defraud. It is too me- 
chanical, too different from all other human affairs. 
Many persons have but the vaguest ideas of the 
history of this Bible. When they think of it at all 
they have only the general idea that they received it 
from their fathers and they from their fathers and 
so on back to its origin. And this is a true account 
of the matter ; only it is just here such persons are 
disturbed by the critics who tell them they are de- 
pending upon tradition and that the Bible really 
came into existence long after it is generally sup- 
posed to have originated. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 51 

Now we may as well have a frank understanding 
about this word tradition, for I have to tell you 
that a large part of the evidence in support of this 
Credential of Antiquity is traditional. To many 
persons this sounds the same as "mythical" or "su- 
perstitious/' and this impression is emphasized by 
the critics. But you may be sure we are not rest- 
ing our faith on any such tradition as this. 

Tradition means simply, "handed down," and re- 
fers usually to that testimony which is transmitted 
orally from age to age, in contrast with that which 
is handed down by written records. And because 
this sort of tradition is so liable to abuse from im- 
perfect memories and evil hearts, leading some- 
times to mere gossip or to statements contradictory 
and absurd, our Saviour severely reproved the Jews 
for trusting in it rather than in the written word. 
But at other times tradition becomes a sort of tes- 
timony meaning nothing less than history ; that is, 
it is the record, written and unwritten, of the be- 
liefs and convictions of the ages. If we set this 
aside we are simply left without explanation or in- 
formation ; that is, without history. 

Turn to whatever department of knowledge we 
will and we see that we must depend upon this sort 
of tradition for our facts. If I ask the classical 
student how he knows that Aristotle wrote the 
works ascribed to him I am answered, "By the nu- 
merous manuscripts widely scattered and of differ- 
ent ages, yet in substantial agreement with each 



52 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

other; and by the concurrent testimony of con- 
temporary or very early authorities." If I ask the 
mathematical student how he knows that Euclid 
wrote the "Elements," he tells me, "By tradition. 
We do not know Euclid's birthplace nor the date 
of his birth, but many incidents of his life, many of 
his sayings have been handed down from century to 
century. His name is connected with the first great 
University, that of Alexandria, as its first great 
mathematician and librarian. All learned men 
have attributed the book to Euclid, and Pappus of 
the third century and Proclus of the fourth are said 
by the best historians to have written treatises and 
commentaries on the book, the original manuscript 
of which they had access to." If I ask the histori- 
cal student how he knows that Washington wrote 
the Farewell Address, he says, "By contemporary 
records by trustworthy witnesses — Hamilton, 
Madison, Jay — to whom Washington submitted the 
original draft when completed, and who all agree 
in the statement that it was written by Washing- 
ton. Besides, the original manuscript still exists 
and may be compared with other writings certainly 
known to be Washington's." 

I have given you these replies in the very words 
of specialists to whom the questions were submit- 
ted. And now I ask you to notice: (1) That only 
one of them suggests the existence of the identical 
thing proposed for proof, and that only because the 
author has been dead but a century. If we were 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 53 

limited then to the identical handwriting of the au- 
thor we should in fact have no history. (2) You 
will observe that all the testimony offered in these 
cases would be insufficient to prevent a man from 
thinking the contrary ; that is to say, none of these 
facts is demonstrated. And no historical fact can 
be demonstrated by historical evidence. Even with 
the manuscript still existing, with the three cele- 
brated men affirming and the unanimous voice of 
the public agreeing, it is yet conceivable that the 
Farewell Address is a forgery. (3) But when 
you have made these qualifications you will still 
have left nothing less than an irresistible convic- 
tion of the truth so delivered. Call it what you 
will, you act on it as unhesitatingly as upon any 
fact whatever. (4) Note finally that the antiquity 
of the tradition does not weaken its force. The 
testimony to one fact may not be as strong as the 
testimony to another, but this is not because the 
tradition has come through more hands, provided 
you can trace the descent at every step. The rec- 
ords of a thousand years can prove as clear a title 
as the records of ten years if there is no break. It 
may be that you are more strongly convinced that 
Washington wrote the Farewell Address than you 
are that Euclid wrote the "Elements." But one 
thing is certain. The same principle that would set 
aside tradition in one case would set it aside in the 
other. To doubt Pappus and Proclus is to doubt 
Hamilton and Madison ; for your relation to all the 



54 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

witnesses is the same. This is not to say that all 
tradition is alike and that we may believe one thing 
as readily as another. But it is to require the reason 
for our disbelief to be furnished in every case. We 
are bound to receive the testimony of tradition, as 
much so as of living witnesses, unless we can im- 
peach its credibility. 

Moses died about fourteen hundred and fifty 
years before Christ was born. To imagine that a 
record of dates and authorship could begin at such 
a stage of human civilization and continue unin- 
terruptedly for thirty-five hundred years is prepos- 
terous. Accordingly we have to depend on allu- 
sions, historical references, quotations and inciden- 
tal testimony to show the integrity of these books. 
If we call this tradition we do not weaken its force. 
The fact that it does not set out to give this testi- 
mony, but drops it incidentally, strengthens it and 
relieves it of all suspicion of fraud. By this method 
we trace our English Bible back to the time when 
it was first translated. And in the same manner 
we trace the history of the Hebrew and Greek 
copies from which it was translated. I cannot 
pause here to give you any of this history, for this 
is the work of a volume itself. But the work has 
been done and is easily accessible. Such abundant 
evidences of this sort exist that no one denies that 
our Old and New Testaments existed as they are 
now at the close of the second century of our era. 
From this point the evidence can be traced back 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 55 

step by step in works now existing until we are 
carried directly to the times of the men who wrote 
the New Testament. These writers in their turn 
become historians, and whether inspired or not, 
Matthew and Peter and Paul have the same right 
to testify to a fact that any other man of their time 
had. What is their testimony? In the New Tes- 
tament not only are the facts of the Old Testament 
presupposed and built upon, but it is directly and 
constantly mentioned. More than six hundred quo- 
tations are made from it and every book is referred 
to except four or five. Josephus, a Jewish histo- 
rian, gives a list of the books of the Old Testament 
identical with ours, showing that in his time, which 
was the time of Christ, the Old Testament was the 
same as it is now. We then go back of this time 
nearly three hundred years to find a Greek transla- 
tion of the Old Testament, and with this a univer- 
sally prevalent tradition among the Jews that Ezra 
and Nehemiah had organized the leading Jews of 
their day into the Great Synagogue for the express 
purpose of preserving the sacred books intact. 
Whether this tradition is reliable or not, there is 
no question that the prophet Ezra did have a prom- 
inent part in the preservation of the sacred books 
of the Jews and was zealous in this work. Now the 
last book of the Old Testament was written before 
Ezra died and in less than two hundred years after 
Ezra's death the Greek translation was made. 
When we once touch the time of the writers of the 



56 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

Old Testament it is as it is in the New. They tes- 
tify to the facts and truths announced by one an- 
other. Although separated by long intervals and 
by great diversity, yet if these books were placed 
before us separately, with no knowledge of their 
relative positions, it is not difficult to believe that 
the arrangement one would make from their con- 
tents alone would not be very different from the 
present arrangement. 

This, in the most meager outline, is a suggestion 
of the continuity of the history of these books, I 
ask you, not whether it is perfect, not whether it is 
possible for the acute historian or critical scholar 
to find flaws and lapses in it; but I ask you to con- 
sider whether there is any similar chain of histori- 
cal evidence in the whole world, or whether an hon- 
est investigator could demand more? If historical 
evidence can prove anything, does it not substan- 
tiate the claim of the Bible to be genuine and con- 
temporaneous history? And if these historical 
data, scattered over such a period of time and in 
such abundance, do not substantiate this claim, 
what do they mean? When you can find any other 
reasonable way of accounting for these data, or 
when you can say they are not there, then you may 
begin your case against the Bible. And when you 
do begin it, remember that this is what you will be 
expected to show : not only that another than the 
accepted theory is conceivable, that you can do of 
course; but (1) that the principle on which you 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 57 

overturn this theory would not also overturn all his- 
tory; (2) that the evidence for your theory is 
stronger than the evidence for this; and (3) how 
men have come to miss the truth for four thousand 
years until you could establish your theory. Or, to 
put a concrete case, it means that to prove that 
Washington did not write the Farewell Address 
you must not only offer historical evidence stronger 
than we now have for the contrary, but you must 
show how the world came to believe that he did 
write it. Nothing comes from nothing, and the 
critic is as much bound by this law as the scientist 
or the student of the Bible. If these Scriptures are 
not contemporary records you must show how man- 
kind has come to believe them to be such and what 
this long line of testimony means. 

2. Let us briefly consider the second item of the 
evidence we have to offer, which is that there is 
solid ground of fact beneath all these records. In 
studying all other religions we are impressed by the 
fact that the religious book is a separate event laid 
on the history of the people to whom it is brought. 
It has a distinct origin in some individual before 
whose time it was unknown. Now the Bible is so 
far different as to be totally unlike this. The re- 
ligion of the Bible is older than the Bible. When 
Jesus spoke of a kingdom his audience knew what 
he meant without explanations. When Moses 
brought a message to the children of Israel he did 
not bring, because there was no need to bring, a rev- 



58 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

elation of him who sent the message. And when 
the Lord appeared to Abraham, commanding him 
to depart out of his home land, he spoke to one who 
was so familiar with the voice that he arose and un- 
questionably obeyed. So it was with the records. 
The armies of Israel first crossed the Red Sea and 
then made a record of it. Their kings reigned and 
then the events of the reign were recorded. Their 
prophets did not arise until sin and apostasy forced 
them to speak. Their poets were moved by great 
deliverances to sing lofty psalms. And thus was 
gradually built up in the national life the history 
and the meaning of that life, which because it is 
true and vital has become the standard for all life 
and sacred. Our religion is not the religion of a 
book, nor is it simply as old as a book. If there had 
been no religion given no book would have been 
written. The religion is as old as man and the 
book is as old as man's ability to record his faith. 
But while this is true, it is also true that this 
Bible has so connected the history of the world with 
the true religion of the world that one bears witness 
to the other. Think of the stupendous folly of sup- 
posing that Moses could deliver to his contem- 
poraries as credible history a narrative of events 
that they then learned for the first time! But it 
was by virtue of the wonderful works performed 
through Moses that his authority as a religious 
teacher could be recognized. If, therefore, these 
historical records are contemporaneous they prove 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 59 

the connected religious authority, and that argu- 
ment suffices to carry the antiquity of the divine au- 
thority of the Scriptures back to their very origin. 

3. This leads us to our third and most impress- 
ive statement. The antiquity of the Scriptures is 
not only the antiquity of a book, and of facts form- 
ing the foundations for the records of that book; 
but its antiquity is a connected, continuous scheme, 
a scheme of progressive development; in other 
words, it is an organized antiquity, not an antiquity 
of isolated facts. 

It is told of Frederick the Great that he once de- 
manded of his chaplain the evidences of revelation 
in one word, and was promptly answered with the 
word "Israel." Whether the anecdote be true or 
not, it points to an unmistakable truth, which is 
that our religion has erected its monuments in the 
history of the world through all the ages. Consider 
the force of the present celebration of the Fourth 
of July as a witness to the historical fact of the 
Declaration of Independence. And in the same 
spirit consider what a witness to the antiquity of 
the Bible is the fact that the same organization to 
which Moses gave the law received all the other 
sections of revelation and still exists, holding those 
same Scriptures and none others than Moses and 
the prophets did write. Their city has fallen, their 
peculiar religious rites have been suspended, their 
temple is desecrated by a heathen mosque erected 
on its ruins, their nationality is utterly broken up, 



60 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

and as a people they wander over the face of the 
earth forever dying and not able to die. Yet still 
"Moses from generations of old hath in every city 
them that preach him, being read in the synagogues 
every Sabbath." All that distinguished them as a 
separate people has perished except one thing. The 
organization among them for the custody of the 
sacred deposit is still intact. So that to their sor- 
rowful question, "What advantage then hath the 
Jews?" the only answer is still Paul's answer, 
"Chiefly because that unto them were committed 
the oracles of God." 

Consider, too, what force there is in the testi- 
mony borne by that simple ceremony of the bread 
and wine you see repeated in all Christian churches 
to-day. Where did it originate and what does it 
mean that one may travel round the globe and in 
every place where Christ is named there he will see 
this ordinance? It means that as to Israel was given 
the custody of the law, so to this ordinance was 
given the custody of the Gospel to preach to all 
in all time the Lord's death. There are many king- 
doms set up in the earth, but there is only one, 
never has been but one world-wide organization, 
and that is the kingdom of God ; set up in the midst 
of kingdoms and republics, going everywhere, every- 
where abiding and holding forth as its most sacred 
treasure the Word of Life. That is what we mean 
by the antiquity of the Scriptures, and that is why 
we call it a divine credential. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 61 

But one thing more should be added to complete 
the statement. It is not simply an organization of 
facts, the Bible itself is an organized fact. The 
New Testament not only recognizes the Old and 
quotes its statements in proof of its own ; the New 
Testament is the Old. It is the same truth grown 
fuller and larger ; the opening out of root and stalk 
into the consummate flower of perfected revelation. 
Long ago Augustine expressed the idea when he 
said, "In the Old Testament the New is concealed; 
in the New Testament the Old is revealed." You 
can no more explain the New Testament without 
the Old than you can explain the oak without the 
acorn. This is the truth expressed frequently in 
the Bible, and which the Epistle to the Hebrews 
was written to emphasize and illustrate. In the 
progress of the scheme men may have seen but little 
of its meaning. Each man poured forth his utter- 
ance as an individual, not fully understanding his 
relation to what went before or what was to come 
after. But in the fullness of time it was seen that 
the God of our fathers and our God was one God ; 
and the prophetic messengers and the divine Son 
were one instrumentality; and our fathers and we 
on whom the ends of the world have come were one 
family, to whom God had been speaking through 
divers portions and in divers manners the one ever- 
lasting Gospel of grace and mercy and peace. 

If we reckon that nothing less than divine power 
can create the seed having life in itself to grow into 



62 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

blade and ear and full corn in the ear; what shall 
we call the power and wisdom which created this 
seed of revelation and planted it in the dawn of the 
world to spring up into the blade of patriarchal 
holiness and the ear of Mosaic legislation and the 
full corn of Christian Redemption? What ex- 
planation can be given of so great a scheme extend- 
ing over sixteen hundred years, occupying thirty 
writers of the most varied station and gifts, includ- 
ing sixty-six separate and different books, yet all 
uniting not by the book-binder's art, but by their 
inherent nature, into one Bible, except the explana- 
tion that "God, who at sundry times and in divers 
manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the 
prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by 
his Son." 



IV 

THE CREDENTIAL OF TESTIMONY 



"In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall 
every word be established." — 2 Corinthians xiii, 1. 



IV 

THE CREDENTIAL OF TESTIMONY 

A principle of testimony stated in several places 
in the Old Testament, but not by any means pecu- 
liar to that dispensation, is, that "in the mouth of 
two or three witnesses shall every word be estab- 
lished." It is the rule in all courts of law and has 
always been observed wherever there has been an 
earnest attempt made to secure justice between 
men. And it is more than a rule for the conduct of 
civil causes. It is a principle of knowledge. How 
little of our knowledge is the result of direct ob- 
servation ! All we know of the past as to what 
men have done or thought, and by far the largest 
part of what we know of the present as to what men 
are doing and thinking, we know on the testimony 
of others. So that a great part of what we call 
getting an education or learning is little more than 
a process of examining witnesses. 

In accordance with this principle of law and jus- 
tice and knowledge, God has ordained that we shall 
learn his will largely through testimony. The last 
chapter was designed to show that this testimony 
was contemporaneous with the events. We now 

65 



66 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

propose to examine the witnesses, not so much to 
learn the substance of their testimony as to discover 
whether they are to be believed and their testimony 
regarded as sufficient to establish the matter. In 
this discussion we shall try to answer two ques- 
tions : ( 1 ) Are the writers of the Bible competent 
as witnesses, and (2) Are they to be believed? If 
we succeed in making good an affirmative answer 
to these questions we shall then endeavor to show 
that the abundance, variety and consistency of this 
testimony are such as to justify us in calling this 
credential divine. 

1. Very little needs to be said upon the first of 
these points, for the usage in the administration of 
justice among men makes the requirements of com- 
petency very simple and few. Any person is held 
to be a competent witness who has personal knowl- 
edge of what he states; who makes his statements 
under a sense of responsibility to God for the truth 
of what he states; and who is not an interested 
party. 

In the case under consideration we may say that 
as to their personal knowledge of the facts they 
narrate, the competency of the witnesses of the 
Bible has been established in the previous chapter, 
where it was shown that they were contem- 
poraneous with the events testified to. And who 
can read the Bible without being struck with the 
impression that these men lived and spake always 
as in the immediate presence of God? They con- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 67 

stantly introduce what they have to say with, "Thus 
saith the Lord." They call upon God in the most 
solemn manner to bear witness to what they say. 
They know the consequences of bearing false wit- 
ness, and it is in fact from these writers that the 
civilized world has learned how to bring home to 
the conscience the duty of telling the truth. Neither 
are these men parties to the record, as they say in 
courts of law. It could not be said of them that 
they had no interest in the matters they testified to, 
for the simple reason that this cannot be said of 
any man. But they had no interest as witnesses. 
It was only because they were men and shared with 
all men the common blessing that they had with all 
a common interest. To establish the truth of their 
statements gave them no peculiar privileges or 
power or importance. As one of them expressed it : 
"For though I preach the gospel, I have nothing to 
glory of; for necessity is laid upon me; yea, woe is 
unto me if I preach not the gospel !" I expect no 
hesitation, therefore, in your mind when I ask you 
to rule of these witnesses that they are competent to 
testify. 

2. The second question is more vital and must 
be treated more at large: Are these witnesses to 
be believed? 

It is an important and a just principle of evi- 
dence that a witness is to be believed until his testi- 
mony has been impeached. Not only the business 
of our courts of law, but all the affairs of human so- 



68 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

ciety would be thrown into confusion if it were not 
accepted as a rule that men generally tell the truth. 
If the contrary assumption were acted upon it 
would be impossible to prove anything by testi- 
mony; for there would be no more reason in that 
event for believing the man who contradicts; a wit- 
ness than for believing the witness himself. If, for 
example, we should be required to take literally the 
assertion about the Cretans, quoted by Paul : "One 
of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said> 
The Cretans are always liars," we should have this 
sort of a logical predicament: if it was a Cretan 
who said, "All the Cretans are liars," the saying is 
false, for the man who said it, being a Cretan, was a 
liar. But if he is a liar and what he says is false 
then the Cretans are truthful, and as he is a Cretan 
he is truthful and what he says is true and the Cre- 
tans are liars and he himself is a liar and what he 
says is untrue. And so we might go on forever 
proving and disproving the same thing. 

We are driven, therefore, both by our nature and 
by our circumstances to the necessity of receiving 
the testimony of a competent witness until the wit- 
ness has been in some way impeached. But if it is 
a general rule of evidence that men usually tell the 
truth, it is no less established as a general fact of 
experience that men do not always tell the truth; 
and it thus becomes the duty of the investigator to 
examine every witness with a view of determining 
the fact in each case. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 69 

When men speak naturally and without con- 
straint they tell the truth, and unless there were 
some temptation, some influence to bend them from 
a natural propensity, they would never tell any- 
thing else. Suppose then we attempt to make a list 
of those temptations most common to men which ac- 
count for the fact that they do not always tell the 
truth. I suppose we would include in our list, ( 1 ) 
Imperfect or undeveloped mental faculties, either 
of observation so that things are imperfectly seen, 
or bad memory, or lack of power to express their 
meaning accurately; men who desire to tell the 
truth but miss it. (2) Mental indolence, leading 
men to treat facts lightly, either because it is too 
much trouble to represent them accurately, or be- 
cause it seems legitimate to make sport of them. 
(3) Exaggeration, sometimes arising from an un- 
governed imagination; more frequently a slovenly 
habit of mind and a failure to bring the speech to 
the bar of conscience. (4) A benevolent disposi- 
tion that dislikes to cause pain and wants peace at 
any price. (5) Prejudice, sometimes uncon- 
sciously entertained and sometimes engendered by 
strong personal interest in a cause. (6) A ma- 
licious nature that loves mischief for its own sake 
or seeks revenge. (7) A depraved moral sense, 
loving a lie more than the truth. ( 8 ) Selfishness, 
hoping for some personal advantage or fearing 
some personal punishment. 

So far as I can see, this list is exhaustive ; but it 



70 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

is not necessary to my purpose that you should ac- 
cept it as such. Certainly these items cover a fair- 
ly wide range and they serve this purpose: if wit- 
nesses are tried by these tests and are impeached 
by none of them the objector is put in the position 
where he must either accept the testimony or 
furnish some further reason why they are not 
to be believed. Accordingly we shall bring the 
writers of the Bible to these tests ; and be- 
cause it is impossible to examine them all we shall 
take the writers of the New Testament, since 
they are nearest to us and since what is proven 
of them may be accepted of those to whom they 
certify. 

With several of these temptations to untruthful- 
ness these witnesses have nothing to do and it 
would be a waste of time to do more than brush 
them away with a word. For instance, no one 
would think of charging them with a disposition 
to treat facts lightly. No writers show more in- 
tense earnestness. They write in the spirit of men 
on the witness stand who must give account of 
what they say to the Judge of all men. Again, the 
uncompromising loyalty to the truth manifested by 
them in other matters forbids us to give any weight 
to the supposition that in the matter of testimony 
they would rather lie than cause pain to their hear- 
ers or provoke their displeasure. Again, to say 
that their malice prompted them to lie, or to say 
that they had such a depraved moral sense as not 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 71 

to know any difference between a lie and a truth 
and to love a lie for its own sake is to set up a con- 
tradiction between the nature and the work of these 
men so glaring and so absurd as to break down the 
supposition by its own weight. What these men 
testified to and published everywhere was the most 
blessed, the most loving good news ever sent to 
men. They devoted their lives to an effort to do 
men good and asked no reward. Surely malicious 
and depraved men must manifest their disposition 
in some way. Yet when these men were repeatedly 
brought before the authorities they were let go be- 
cause nothing could be found against them. It is 
preposterous to assume that malice could prompt a 
man to lie for another man's benefit, or that de- 
praved men would do nothing but good deeds. 
Equally absurd seems that part of the eighth sup- 
position which would attribute their untruthful- 
ness to a selfish dread of punishment. For they 
were never punished for keeping still, but always 
offered free pardon for so doing. If what they 
wrote was not true and they were punished for say- 
ing it was true, why would not dread of punish- 
ment make them cease rather than persist in saying 
it? Or was it a superstitious dread of divine pun- 
ishment that kept them repeating what they knew 
was not true? But who ever had such an incon- 
gruous idea of God as this? If the Gospel they 
preached was false there is but one rational conclu- 
sion about God, and that is that he does not exist, 



72 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

or if he does he would never punish men for honor- 
ing and worshiping him. 

The remaining suppositions require rather more 
detailed examination because they are more dwelt 
upon by critics. An effort has been made, for in- 
stance, to base a philosophical explanation of the 
Gospel history on the theory that the writers were 
prejudiced and under the influence of an overpow- 
ering personality they became enthusiasts and so 
colored the facts to suit their disposition. This is 
simply a theory and no facts are offered us in sup- 
port of it. On the other hand, if we must argue 
from the record itself the proof is incontestable 
that such a theory is without foundation. These 
writers give a plain, unimpassioned account of 
what was said and done. They show their candor 
by recording facts which reflect upon themselves. 
We know they were unbelieving, slow to under- 
stand, easily led into error, timid in the hour of 
danger and jealous of each other. But we have 
learned these things not from their enemies, but 
from their own statements. And while it is true 
that they had a theory of Christ, yet their own rec- 
ord shows that their theory was totally wrong. 
They were surprised and disappointed to the very 
last that Jesus did not establish a temporal king- 
dom. And surely it is beyond belief that a leader 
should address to his enthusiastic followers at the 
close of his mission words of strong rebuke for 
their dullness and inability to comprehend what he 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 73 

had been endeavoring so long to make plain to 
them. Yet this is what Jesus said to his disciples 
after his resurrection : a O fools, and slow of heart 
to believe all that the prophets have spoken." 

Other critics base their objection to the truthful- 
ness of these records on the suppositions which I 
have numbered 1 and 2 in the list given ; and they 
mean that these witnesses are not to be believed 
because, although they might have been honest, 
they were mistaken. They were untrained men, 
without experience in critical observation, and 
therefore easily imposed on. And, moreover, like 
all men of that early, unscientific time, their natu- 
ral appetite for the marvelous led them to exagger- 
ate so that they were easily made to believe what 
they wanted to believe. Now in reference to this 
we may admit at once that these men were un- 
trained, and, if you will, unscientific. It is in this 
sense that they are spoken of in the Bible as "un- 
learned and ignorant men." They were not skilled 
historians, nor scientists, nor philosophers. But 
neither did they claim to be such. They claimed to 
be only witnesses, and it is only as such we have 
any right to try them. Nor does the case require 
them to be any more than witnesses. They do not 
offer us a scientific treatise, but a statement of 
facts. How much learning must a man have to be 
a witness of fact? When a matter of fact is to be 
established in our courts is a philosopher any bet- 
ter as a witness than a plain man? We ask a wit- 



74 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

ness not, Where were you educated? but, Were you 
present when this thing occurred and in full pos- 
session of your faculties? These witnesses were 
present and the things they saw were as familiar to 
them as if they had been philosophers. They knew 
what a lame man was; they had seen paralytics all 
their lives, and when they say they saw such men 
cured and restored to the full use of their powers 
they are stating simple matters of fact. Such facts 
require, to be sure, a great deal of learning to ex- 
plain but very little to state truthfully whether 
they happened or not. It is possible that they did 
not happen, but it is no proof of it to say that the 
witnesses have not learning enough to explain 
them. 

No supposition is left us on which to impeach 
these witnesses but to say that they wrote lies for 
their own personal advantage. Their own account 
of the matter is far different and is confirmed by 
history we have no right to reject. Personal ad- 
vantage ! How grotesque this seems when applied 
to the early disciples of Jesus the Nazarene ! Hear 
Peter, "Lord, we have left all and followed thee." 
Hear Paul, a Even unto this present hour we both 
hunger and thirst and are naked and are buffeted 
and have no certain dwelling place; and labor, 
working with our own hands; being reviled, we 
bless ; being persecuted, we suffer it ; being defamed, 
we intreat; we are made as the filth of the world, 
and are the offscouring of all things unto this day." 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 75 

Now tell me why? Why should such a genius as 
Paul have this account to give of the rewards of 
life? Simply that he "counted all things but loss 
for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ." And 
all these witnesses in their degree received the same 
reward. Not one of them but could have purchased 
immunity by simply keeping still and ceasing to 
testify. Yet they deliberately and persistently 
went on speaking, "Not fearing the wrath of the 
king, for they endured, as seeing him who is invisi- 
ble." When authority thundered its prohibition 
and drove them from place to place; when prisons 
opened as their only refuge and crosses were lifted 
as their final doom; when they were denied the 
rights of society and the protection of law and 
were made the lawful prey of assassins, none of 
these things moved them, neither counted they 
their lives dear unto themselves. And what did 
they count dear? What was the advantage they 
expected? They coveted no man's gold or apparel ; 
they asked no man's favor or protection; they 
sought no man's position or power; they had no 
ambition and no mission but only this : "that I may 
accomplish my course and the ministry which I re- 
ceived from the Lord Jesus, to testify the gos- 
pel of the grace of God." What is to be thought 
of a theory that is reduced to such desperate 
straits that it cannot establish its own truth 
except by making selfish liars of such heroes as 
these? 



76 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

We have thus gone over all the items of what 
might be called the bill of impeachment, and I 
trust it will not seem boastful to say that nothing 
appears in any serious degree to reflect upon the 
veracity of our witnesses. In fact, it is plain that 
but one recourse is left to those who would have us 
still refuse to believe them; they must produce a 
contradicting witness ; a man as well situated with 
respect to the facts as our witnesses who yet saw 
nothing of the kind. This would seem a most sim- 
ple and natural method of procedure and unques- 
tionably the very first to occur to a skeptic. Why 
then has he not been produced? These witnesses 
in their lifetime were surrounded by powerful ene- 
mies. The most influential and prominent organi- 
zation of their time felt this testimony to be so 
dangerous to their supremacy that they declared, 
"If we let these men alone all men will believe on 
him." But of all the devices at their command 
for suppressing or vitiating their testimony they 
never tried that most effective and simple of all de- 
vices, that of denying the truth of what was testi- 
fied to. "Beholding the man which was healed 
standing with them they could say nothing against 
it." Why not? Men who would not hesitate to 
murder would surely not be too conscientious to 
bring forward even false witnesses. Why did they 
not try the plan which had succeeded in hurrying 
Jesus to the cross? Ah, it was not because the plan 
was wrong, but because it was useless. "For that 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 77 

indeed a notable miracle hatli been done by them 
is manifest to all them that dwell in Jerusalem; 
and we cannot deny it.' 7 

In all contemporaneous history and in all suc- 
ceeding criticism no man has been bold enough to 
oiler a witness contradicting these matters of fact, 
except once. The soldiers guarding the sepuicher 
where Jesus was laid contradicted the testimony of 
the disciples that Jesus had risen from the dead 
and declared that the body had been stolen by the 
disciples while they were asleep. So here at last 
we have the missing witnesses testifying to what 
took place while they were asleep! This silly lie 
of the Jews, concocted in the first moments of alarm 
at the miscarriage of all their schemes, would not 
deserve notice in any serious treatment of this sub- 
ject were it not for a method of criticism hardly 
less stupid which flies to the mythical theory of 
Strauss or the enthusiast theory of Eenan, or any 
theory, however wild, if only it may be saved from 
accepting the plain, common-sense theory that these 
witnesses testified as they did because the events 
happened as they are described. 

Having now established, as we trust, the fact 
that the writers of the Bible are competent wit- 
nesses and that they are to be believed both because 
no presumption against their veracity can be sup- 
ported and because they have never been contra- 
dicted ; we now come to a brief consideration of the 
character of this testimony to show its abundance, 



78 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

variety and consistency, justifying us in calling it 
a divine credential. 

Every matter shall be established by two or three 
witnesses; and this is not only the standard of our 
ordinary affairs, but even in the most formal and 
important concerns of our courts the same rule is 
found sufficient. But we claim that the credentials 
of the Bible are divine ; and while the Credential of 
Testimony is not divine in its nature, it is in itfe 
degree. That is, the testimony of these witnesses 
is of the same kind as any other testimony, but it 
is different in quantity. In this Bible of sixty-six 
separate treatises we have thirty different writers 
ranging over a period of sixteen hundred years. 
This in itself constitutes an array of testimony 
hardly to be paralleled. But when we consider 
that this number represents only the written testi 
mony, and that thousands of others in the same age 
and in every age have left us similar testimony ex- 
pressed in their deeds, their sufferings and their 
blood ; men who freely ventured their all upon these 
same facts and died commending them to their chil- 
dren ; then indeed we get some conception of what 
is meant by saying that we are "compassed about 
by so great a cloud of witnesses." It is nothing 
less than a divine characteristic that such multi- 
tudes of so many ages should have persisted in tes- 
tifying to the same great truths and in spite of the 
experience of the same stubborn opposition on the 
part of their contemporaries. The fashion of this 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 79 

world passes away ; men take up and abandon many 
strange notions ; in one short human life one's point 
of view changes and one's profoundest convictions 
are modified more frequently than the number of 
his years. If man's physical organization under- 
goes a complete change every seven years his men- 
tal and spiritual organization is no less fluctuating. 
But humanity has one definite and unchangeable 
conviction ; it has spoken through thousands of in- 
struments to one clear, persistent note ; God's word 
abideth in man forever and forever. 

Again, it is no less remarkable that this testi- 
mony should be so varied. If it is counted a de- 
preciation of several witnesses that they tell their 
story all in exactly the same words and in the 
same manner, how wonderful it seems that God 
should give us the testimony to this wonderful book 
in such wonderful variety as to exclude all possible 
suspicion of collusion on the part of the witnesses ! 
In the written testimony there is every variety of 
writing. Here are history and poetry and law and 
political economy and war and prophecy and ethics 
and philosophy. And in each of these there is va- 
riety. The law is given by statute, by symbolic 
ceremonial and by poetic fancy, yet these three are 
one. The same life is written by four historians, 
each revealing a different point of view and a dif- 
ferent purpose, but all telling the same marvelous 
story. The message is given to the poet ; and one 
sings exultant anthems, another mourns in pathetic 



80 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

elegies, another images it under an idyllic love pas- 
toral, another plays with fantastic enigmas of wis- 
dom's lore. Prophetic declarations range from the 
untutored sentences of a humble herdsman to the 
finished periods and lofty conceptions of the sub- 
limest writer of all time. But the message is one, 
no simplicity being too bare to adorn it and no sub- 
limity too gorgeous to hide it. 

In the unwritten testimony there is the same va- 
riety. The noble army of martyrs enrolls all ages, 
all conditions, both sexes. Those who have lived 
enduring a great fight of afflictions, as well as those 
who have sealed their testimony with their blood, 
are as the sand on the seashore for multitude and 
as the leaves of the forest for variety. There is not 
a place where men may live, nor an occupation men 
may follow, which has not had its witnesses. 
These all, according to their ability and in harmony 
with their surroundings, speak forth in their own 
measure the wonderful works of God. 

In the midst of this wonderful abundance and 
this wonderful variety is to be seen a still more 
wonderful consistency. This is a characteristic of 
testimony universally insisted upon. An incon- 
sistent witness may not be false, but for practical 
purposes he might as well be, and so we rule him 
out on the maxim, "False in one, false in all." 

The consistency of the writers of the Bible is not 
a studied, formal consistency. It has been pointed 
out by another that if men had been the determin- 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 81 

ing authority of the testimony to Christ's life in- 
stead of the mere instruments, it is likely the apos- 
tles and principal disciples would have assembled 
immediately after the ascension and would have 
drawn up a formal statement of all the facts and 
certified them, so that there could be no possible 
inconsistency in the witnesses to these facts in the 
future. Instead of this the evangelists appear to 
have exercised absolute freedom in the compilation 
of their gospels, sometimes repeating each other, 
and again adding particulars not given elsewhere, 
and always preserving an individuality throughout 
their account. So it is with the doctrinal state- 
ments. There is no assignment of parts, no ap- 
pearance of specialism in theology. Each treats 
any or all doctrines in his own way. 

And now what is the result? This history of the 
life and opinions of Jesus of Nazareth has come 
down to us through twenty centuries. It has been 
copied thousands of times. It has been subjected 
to all the vicissitudes of ordinary human condi- 
tions. It has been scrutinized with microscopic 
severity. And what have we left? The editors of 
the latest critical edition of the New Testament, 
speaking of various readings which give some per- 
sons so much concern, tell us that there is a very 
exaggerated idea of their extent and importance. 
"The great bulk of the words of the New Testament 
stand out above all discriminative processes of crit- 
icism, because they are free from variation and need 



82 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

only to be transcribed. If comparative trivialities, 
such as changes of order, the insertion or omission 
of the article with proper names, and the like, are 
set aside, the words in our opinion still subject to 
doubt can hardly amount to more than a thou- 
sandth part of the whole New Testament." 

This refers to minute textual criticism. For as 
to the substance of the book, its consistency 
throughout has been demonstrated by overwhelm- 
ing evidence. The last century has witnessed a 
series of attacks against the consistency of the 
Bible such as has never been known against any 
book in the world. Skepticism directed its first at- 
tack against the Bible within the limits of the un- 
derstandings of plain men, and the result was dis- 
astrous defeat. Now we are met by a criticism 
which wages war in the sphere of the specialist and 
plain men are bidden to accept results without at- 
tempting to understand and even without asking 
for reasons. On the authority of the specialist we 
are required to believe, although we cannot under- 
stand, that James contradicts Paul and John does 
not agree with Luke; that the historians are not 
consistent with each other and not always with 
themselves; that Isaiah is not Isaiah, but two, 
three, maybe six different prophets; and as for 
Moses, it only appears as a name which was as- 
sumed by almost any writer that had anything to 
say of the history of antiquity. 

Out of it all comes to the plain man this same 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 83 

divine integer, the Holy Bible ; many books but one 
fact; many writers, but one testimony. So uniform 
and so consistent is it in all essential matters that 
it is by no means difficult to read it straight 
through Avithout having the thought of different 
writers intrude on the mind. Just as one picture 
in nature is made of many features; just as there 
are many leaves but only one foliage; just as no 
two faces are alike, yet there is one persistent type 
of humanity; so God has made of the testimony of 
all ages a mosaic so united, so natural and so com- 
plete that we spend time in vain to discover the 
joints. We confess our inability by calling the 
Bible not a library but a book ; and we concede the 
marvelous character of its consistency by calling it 
a divine book. The exclamation of the Psalmist is 
fit to stand for the sober conclusion of the most 
rigid investigator, "Thy testimonies are wonderful ! 
Concerning thy testimonies I have known of old 
that thou hast founded them forever." • 



THE CREDENTIAL OF REASON 



"Why should it be thought a thing incredible 
with you that God should raise the dead?" — Acts 
xxvi, 8. 



THE CREDENTIAL OF REASON 

I endeavored in the last chapter to remove from 
jour minds all suspicion of the veracity of the 
writers of the Bible by subjecting them to all the 
known tests for untruthfulness. I do not feel that 
more is necessary to be said to convince you of the 
honesty and truthfulness of these witnesses. But 
I recognize the fact that we have not yet touched 
upon a subject which concerns us vitally in accept- 
ing testimony and which has no reference to the 
character of the witnesses ; I mean the improbabil- 
ity of the story they tell. In some cases we may 
acknowledge our inability to impeach the witnesses 
or to account for the untruthfulness of the narra- 
tive, while yet our reason forbids us to credit it. 
Certainly we do not believe one thing as readily as 
another. Every time a statement is made to us 
we find ourselves using our judgment not so much 
upon the character of the person making it as upon 
the nature of the statement itself. When I am 
asked if I believe this or that person I frequently 
find it necessary to qualify my answer by saying 

87 



88 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

that it depends upon what he testifies to; and in 
almost every case the credibility of the testimony 
will be affected by the nature of the fact testified to. 

It is on the ground that the statements of the 
Bible are supposed to be in themselves improbable 
and to such a degree as to be incredible that 
some persons withhold their assent, claiming that 
whether they can furnish a reasonable account of 
the way these statements originated or not, they 
cannot do violence to their reason by accepting 
statements which are unbelievable. And in answer 
to the charge that they are unreasonable and in- 
consistent in refusing to believe a witness they can- 
not impeach, they reply that they would be more 
inconsistent and guilty in believing statements 
which their reason pronounced incredible. It is to 
such persons I address these remarks for the pur- 
pose of showing that the Bible has also a Credential 
of Eeason ; that is to say, the statements of the Bible 
are not unbelievable, and under the most rigid 
scrutiny of reason are found in perfect accord with 
all its demands. 

The writers of the Bible not only thought they 
were telling the truth, but they were convinced 
that the truth they told was credible. After chal- 
lenging impeachment as witnesses they challenged 
with as much boldness the trial by reason. They 
summoned all the faculties of man's superior na- 
ture to show cause why these statements should not 
stand; any of these facts; even such as would be 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 89 

naturally regarded most improbable. "Why should 
it be thought incredible with you that God should 
raise the dead?" 

1. Let us consider in the first place why it is 
that some facts are improbable so that we hesitate, 
if we do not refuse, to accept them. 

(a) One answer is that something of what we 
are disposed to regard as improbability in the fact 
is after all only a habit of skepticism produced in 
us by our experience with human testimony . There 
was a time when we believed everything. Fairy 
tales were real; fables were not incongruous; the 
greater the wonder the greater was our delight in 
believing. What has made the difference? Expe- 
rience. We have learned that men sometimes de- 
ceive us and that things are not always what they 
seem. This has taught us not to trust first im- 
pressions, not to believe everything, to prove all 
things. In all this there has been no change in the 
facts, but our relation to them has been changed. 

(ft) We have a certain knowledge gained by ob- 
servation which becomes a standard to us for all 
future knowledge ; and our first impulse is to reject 
as improbable whatever is different from what we 
already know. Mr. Huxley puts the case in this 
way: "If a man tells me that he saw a piebald 
horse in Piccadilly, I believe him without hesita- 
tion. If the same person tells me he observed a 
zebra there, I might hesitate a little about accept- 
ing his testimony. If, however, my informant as- 



90 DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 

sured me that he beheld a centaur trotting down 
that famous thoroughfare, I should emphatically 
decline to credit his statement; and this even if he 
were the most saintly of men and ready to suffer 
martyrdom in support of his belief." I do not sup- 
pose Mr. Huxley would give any other reason for 
not believing than that the existence of horses was 
a matter of common observation, while he had never 
seen, nor had he ever heard of one who had seen a 
centaur. So far as the nature of the fact goes one 
is no more improbable than the other. If I should 
tell a man who had never seen or heard of either of 
these creatures that I had seen an animal with a 
certain kind of body and head followed by another 
animal with the same kind of body but with a head 
like a man's, he would be no more disposed to reject 
one part of the statement than the other. To offer 
another illustration. If I should tell you that I 
saw a man jump over a house you would not believe 
me ; but you would not have any reason for not be- 
lieving except your observation of man's ability in 
this direction. If you had never seen a man jump 
at all and I should offer you his bones and muscles 
for examination you would not be able to decide 
how far he could jump or whether he could jump at 
all ; and you would be disposed to believe one state- 
ment as readily as another. 

Let it be remembered, then, that a great part of 
what we hold to be improbable is due to nothing but 
a want of knowledge on our part, or, to call it by 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 91 

its true name, ignorance. Accordingly the area of 
skepticism is constantly decreasing. Almost every 
modern invention is an illustration of the improb- 
able becoming the actual. Those who hailed with 
ridicule the announcement of the locomotive, the 
telegraph and the telephone ceased to ridicule upon 
the enlargement of their knowledge. And so the 
area of the improbable will continue to grow less 
as we grow in knowledge. The motto of the wise 
man will cease to be, "Be careful what you believe," 
and become, "Be careful what you doubt." The 
difficulty with all such facts is not in them but 
in us. 

(c) Another and a more philosophical method 
of testing the improbability of facts is by compar- 
ing them with the experience we have of the nature 
of the objects affected by the facts. Take human 
nature, for instance. We know to some extent 
what kind of a being man is and the principles of 
his conduct. If we are told something that he did 
which is contradictory of his nature as known to 
us we declare the fact improbable. Or take the 
nature of the visible universe. We know many of 
the laws by which these things act and react, so 
that what contradicts these laws we do not believe. 
If a stone is said to float in the air we know enough 
of the nature of stone to compel us to disbelieve the 
story. 

It was on this ground of experience of the laws 
of nature that Hume based his celebrated argument 



92 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

against miracles. Miracles, according to their 
definition, are interruptions if not violations of the 
laws of nature as known to men. When it is re- 
ported to us, therefore, that miracles have occurred, 
Hume argued that we are bound to reason in this 
way : Our belief in the uniformity of nature rests 
on experience and our belief in testimony has the 
same foundation. But our experience of the uni- 
formity of nature is without any break, whereas we 
have experienced exceptions to the truth of human 
testimony. We must therefore balance these two 
kinds of experience, for we have no other means of 
judging them; and it is easier to believe that ex- 
perience which has never deceived us. Hence no 
amount of testimony can prove a miracle. It is in- 
credible because it contradicts our knowledge of 
nature. 

(d) Lastly, we are so constituted as beings of 
reason that some things are self-evident. We know 
such things to be true without any proof, and we 
immediately dismiss as incredible any testimony 
which contradicts such truths. This is very differ- 
ent from contradictions of testimony, or our own 
observation, or our knowledge of men and physical 
nature. This is a contradiction of consciousness, 
which is absurd. When I am looking at an object 
before me I cannot admit any testimony that there 
is no object before me. To think that what I am 
conscious of can be contradicted is inconceivable. 
No testimony to the contrary could have the slight- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 93 

est effect in persuading me that I do not exist. Such, 
things as these are the real, and in fact the only in- 
herently incredible things. 

2. This is a correct account, I believe, of the 
reasons why certain things seem to us improbable. 
It is of the greatest moment to us to know if reason 
declares of any of the facts of the Bible that the im- 
probability is too great for belief. But before ex- 
amining this matter directly I propose to ask if 
there is any way by which improbability in a fact 
may be overcome and belief in it rendered easier 
without qualifying the fact, 

(a) As an answer to this question I suggest 
that in our courts of law any fact may be estab- 
lished by competent evidence, and improbability 
is not allowed in bar against positive testimony. 
It occurred to me to frame a hypothetical case and 
submit it to competent legal authority with a view 
of determining what standing improbability had in 
court. The case was this: A sues B to enforce 
the fulfillment of the following covenant: A 
agreed for a sum of money to go to a place named 
at midday and there in the presence of twelve wit- 
nesses, without any external appliances, but solely 
by his own natural powers, to fly above the solid 
ground for the space of one hour. The covenant 
is admitted and the sworn testimony of twelve men 
of good repute, having no personal interest in the 
transaction, is submitted, all agreeing substantially 
that they know A and saw him fly at the time and 



94 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

place and in the manner specified. B resists pay- 
ment and pleads that the thing alleged is improba- 
ble to the extent of absurdity ; that it is contrary to 
all experience and what no amount of testimony 
can establish, being, in fact, a plain impossibility. 
That consequently the testimony of the witnesses 
must be false, since it is more reasonable to suppose 
that twelve men should testify falsely or mistaken- 
ly than to suppose that a man could fly in the man- 
ner specified. The judge to whom I submitted this 
case gave me the following opinion : "Considering 
the case presented I find but little difficulty in say- 
ing that the plaintiff has made out his case and is 
entitled to judgment. The plaintiff agrees to do 
a certain thing at a specified time and in the pres- 
ence of twelve credible witnesses, whose testimony 
concurs in proof of the facts stated; and as far as 
human testimony can or does establish anything 
with certainty, the case is established. Now the 
defendant rests his case on negative proof; or per- 
haps it would be better said on mere inference based 
upon improbability. The recluctio ad absurdum 
cannot prevail against preponderating positive 
proof. All human affairs as to their credibility 
or incredibility are measured by the weight and 
character of the testimony of reliable witnesses, 
either in establishing or controverting a fact. So 
that in my opinion you make out too strong a case 
for the plaintiff to be in the slightest degree dis- 
turbed by the defense set up by the defendant." 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 95 

Now I think it will be admitted that this is a fair 
statement of an improbable case, and that no case 
in the Bible is more so. The opinion simply means 
that if any objector could be sued for the perform- 
ance of a covenant based upon the facts of the 
Bible, supported by the testimony which the Bible 
offers, he would have judgment rendered against 
him in any of our courts, notwithstanding his plea 
of incredibility. 

(b) A second suggestion in answer to the ques- 
tion how improbability may be overcome is that im- 
probability before proof is a very different thing 
from improbability after proof. In the first case 
it is a lack of knowledge. It is simply saying, "We 
never saw it done and we know no reason for sup- 
posing it could be done." In the second case it is 
stubborn resistance to knowledge without reason. 
It is saying, "We never had testimony or observa- 
tion before of such a thing, and we refuse now to 
receive testimony to such a thing." But, as But- 
ler says, "There is very strong presumption against 
the most ordinary facts before the proof of them; 
which yet is overcome by almost any proof." Let 
a man have a pretended fortune-teller narrate to 
him a series of incidents to happen to him in the 
future. The presumption against such a combina- 
tion of ordinary events is as a million to one. Yet 
in looking back over his past life he will find just 
such combinations, and there is no improbability 
whatever in the same facts after they have been 



96 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

proved. The improbability is not in the facts them- 
selves but in announcing them before they happen. 

(c) Finally, it may be suggested that facts 
which are regarded as improbable when standing 
alone frequently become credible by the connec- 
tions. These connected facts may go before as 
showing the reason for the following, or as prepara- 
tory to them. Or they may follow and thus throw 
light upon them and as an explanation of them 
make them less improbable. If I were told that a 
sane man put all his fortune into gold and then de- 
liberately threw it into the sea, and were told noth- 
ing more, I should regard the story as highly im- 
probable. But if I were told that an epidemic or 
a war forced him to leave his home, and that he 
turned his fortune into gold so as to take it with 
him, and that he was shipwrecked and threw his 
gold away to save his life, the story would not be 
improbable at all. 

So that we see by these hints that improbability 
is not a quality inhering in certain facts and char- 
acteristic of them, but is a purely accidental cir- 
cumstance. It may be present or not. It may be 
present at one time and not at another. Some- 
times it may hinder or prevent belief, but it may 
also be entirely overthrown and admit entire con- 
fidence. 

3. We have thus far been reaching the question 
indirectly, and I trust the suggestions made have 
availed to narrow very much the field of discussion. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 97 

Many of the facts of the Bible do not admit of any 
suspicion of improbability. They are such as all 
men are disposed to admit. Of many others it may 
be said that if any hesitate to accept them their 
chief difficulty arises from separating such facts 
from their natural connections and excluding both 
their foregoing explanations and their confirma- 
tory results. We have left a class of facts which 
we call miraculous, which many men rule out at 
once as not susceptible of discussion even, because 
they regard them as a direct challenge to men to 
lay aside their reason and become not only believ- 
ing but credulous. That we may face this difficulty 
at once we have chosen that which is the greatest 
marvel of all and challenge reason to show even in 
this any improbability amounting to incredibility. 
"Why should it be thought a thing incredible with 
you that God should raise the dead?" And the re- 
mainder of this chapter will be an effort to justify 
directly this challenge by offering in addition to 
the general reasons already given a few suggestions 
that show that the Bible in its most wonderful facts 
has still a Credential of Beason. 

(a) The resurrection of Christ is a matter of 
fact supported by credible testimony, and the man 
who sets it aside is bound to furnish sufficient rea- 
sons for his unbelief. The fact is of supreme im- 
portance and men are justified in pausing before it 
until an amount of positive testimony has been 
furnished sufficient to preclude the possibility of 



98 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

mistake. But more than this we have no right to 
require and this we have no right to reject. Mr. 
Huxley may say he will not believe this or that, but 
Mr. Huxley is as much bound by the rules of evi- 
dence as anybody else. The question is not what 
will Mr. Huxley believe, but what ought he as a 
reasonable man to believe. Mere personal incre- 
dulity has no more force than mere arbitrary as- 
sertion. I shall not stop here to set forth the evi- 
dence of our Lord's resurrection. It is accessible 
to all ; no man who frankly considers that evidence 
can consistently reject it, and the fact is that few 
do. 

(5) There are others who do not take such a 
strenuous position against the testimony as to re- 
fuse to consider it, who yet practically annul it by 
claiming that only a trained scientist, an expert in 
the laws of nature, could be competent to give tes- 
timony to establish a miracle; because other men 
might take that for a miracle which was really only 
a somewhat rare operation of nature. 

This objection seems to me to confuse evidence 
of a fact with explanation of a fact. Whether the 
events recorded in the Bible are really miracles is 
one thing, and whether they happened as they are 
described is quite another thing. I hope to show 
in the next chapter that they are miracles and that 
as such they are a distinct credential. But what I 
am now trying to show is that we have no right to 
reject them for the lack of expert testimony. The 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 99 

witnesses are experts for all purposes alleged. Be- 
ing alive after being dead is just as much a matter 
of fact as being dead after being alive. If I allege 
that a man died of poison my witness must be an 
expert in detecting the presence and action of 
poison. But if witnesses allege that they saw Jesus 
die, saw him buried, saw his grave guarded by his 
enemies and three days afterward saw him alive 
and talked and ate with him, it is no impeachment 
to say that they do not understand the laws of na- 
ture. If they know the difference between a dead 
man and a live one they are experts for all the pur- 
poses alleged. Why should it be thought incredi- 
ble because the witnesses to the fact cannot give a 
scientific explanation of the fact? 

■(c) But I do not propose to rest the case here. 
I attack this unbelief in its very origin. I deny 
that such a fact as the rising of the dead is in its 
nature an incredible thing and must for this reason 
be removed from the class of facts which may be 
established by testimony. If we take the fact by 
itself and consider its nature alone it cannot be 
shown that rising from the dead is essentially any 
more incredible than dying. If I choose to cavil I 
can raise as many objections to the statement that 
a man died as you can to the statement that he rose 
from the dead. If you tell me there is no natural 
way to account for a dead man coming to life I tell 
you with precisely the same cogency that there is 
no natural way to account for a living man dying. 



100 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

Look at this marvel we call man! Wonderfully 
and fearfully made! Who can understand him? 
Who by searching can find him out? He speaks, 
he reasons, he feels, he wills, he communes with 
you, writes his thoughts on your soul and takes 
your thoughts into his soul and the pulse of mutual 
life throbs back and forth between you through 
distance and time and all intervening obstacles. 
Can you tell me how or why? And will you say 
that outside of experience you know anything in 
his nature to suggest that in a year or a day he will 
cease to reason, cease to commune with his friends, 
cease to control the world of matter and himself 
turn to matter, drop into mere dust and leave you 
not a trace of himself? If you had no experience 
with death what would be more improbable? And 
even in spite of our experience every death is still 
the strangest fact of all our experience. 

But, you say, men die every day and we do not 
see men raised from the dead ; and we only know it 
is the nature of man to die and not his nature to 
rise from the dead. No, we do not know this; this 
is only our hypothesis, our guess. This is what 
Hume is relying upon when he says that the uni- 
formity of nature confirms one testimony and con- 
futes the other. W'hen men say certain things hap- 
pen by the uniformity of nature they often think 
they are explaining something; when in fact they 
are only saying how often the thing has been done 
or how often they have seen it done. They under- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 101 

stand it no better than before, but it grows familiar 
by repetition and we are prone to think we under- 
stand what is familiar. 

Take an example from chemistry. The professor 
puts in my hand something he calls potassium 
iodide and I see that it is white. He shows me a 
liquid he calls sulphuric acid and I see that it is 
colorless. He asks me what color the acid will be 
if I dissolve the iodide in it, and I answer white, of 
course. I drop it in and a deep violet is the result. 
I see my ignorance and beg to know why this result 
is produced. He tells me the acid and the potas- 
sium are congenial elements, so that potassium for- 
sakes the element it is combined with and joins the 
acid, leaving the iodine to dissolve into color. That 
sounds scientific, and indeed is scientific, but it 
does not answer my question. My question was 
"Why?" and this is the answer to "How?" I want 
to know why potassium and sulphuric acid are con- 
genial, and why iodine and sulphuric acid are not. 
The professor does not know. What then is the 
difference between my ignorance and the profes- 
sor's science? As far as the nature of the fact is 
concerned there is no difference. Neither of us 
knows why. The amount of his science is that he 
has seen it done, and as soon as I see it done I am 
as scientific as he is. 

This is the uniformity of nature. It is simply 
what we are used to. The King of Siam was scien- 
tific and reasoned from the uniformity of nature 



102 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

when he refused to believe the Dutch ambassador, 
who said he had seen an army cross a river by 
walking on its frozen surface. And stripped of 
technicalities that is what Hume means by saying 
the raising of the dead is incredible; he was not 
used to it. If you could summon his ghost and 
tell it you can go from New York to London in five 
days; you can send a message from New York to 
London in five seconds; and you can sit in your 
office and hear your friend's voice eight hundred 
miles away, it would still say, true to the only 
philosophy it knows : "I cannot believe what I am 
not used to. Nature is uniform and the truth of 
human testimony is not." 

This is not caricature. It is a sober account of 
our knowledge of the uniformity of nature. What 
we know about nature has been found out by pa- 
tiently watching and remembering what nature 
does. But the uniformity of nature is not a self- 
evident truth. There is no way to tell what nature 
is going to do by looking at nature before anything 
has been done. With what consistency then can we 
press the uniformity of nature against the credibil- 
ity of testimony when our very knowledge of the 
uniformity of nature is received from testimony, 
and when we must confess that if nature should re- 
verse all her operations we should understand the 
new method just as well as the old and regard it 
just as credible after we got used to it? 

(d) Finally we come to the last test suggested 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 103 

that some things were incredible because they con- 
tradicted our consciousness. No man would say 
that any knowledge we have gained by experience, 
or any insight we have into the nature of either 
men or things is of such a character that no new 
knowledge contradicting the old can be admitted. 
We do not believe the sun goes round the earth, but 
men once believed it, and for all we can tell may be- 
lieve it again. But no man ever believed and no 
man ever can believe as long as he is sane that a 
part of a thing is as great as the whole of it; or 
that a man can be alive and not alive at the same 
time. These we say are inconceivable statements 
and no new knowledge can ever make them con- 
ceivable. The question then is, are there any such 
statements in the Bible? Will any man affirm that 
he is conscious Christ did not rise from the dead, 
and that such a statement is inconceivable to him 
just as if the witnesses had testified that Christ 
was alive and not alive at the same time? 

Some have ventured to say something very much 
like this when they have asserted that to believe 
in the resurrection of the dead is to believe in an 
effect without a cause. This is said on the assump- 
tion that what has no natural cause has no cause. 
But the assumption is altogether false. We do not 
believe that natural causes raised Jesus from the 
dead nor that he was raised without a cause. Our 
challenge is "Why should it be thought a thing in- 
credible with you that God should raise the dead?" 



104 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

The man who does not believe in God cannot indeed 
furnish a cause for such an effect as this, but 
neither can he furnish an intelligible cause for any- 
thing. Without God man is not only without hope 
for the future but he is without any rational clue 
to the present. Nature is a universal blank, ex- 
perience is a maze and action is purposeless. But 
add the thought of God and the mystery disappears, 
all is clear and all is sublime. Everything is at 
once lifted out of the commonplace. Add the 
thought of God to this visible universe and we then 
understand that the things which are seen were not 
made of things which do appear. He spake and it 
was done; he commanded and it stood fast. Add 
the thought of God to our life and the lowly roof of 
our present habitation lifts itself to take in the 
everlasting ages; we are no longer the prisoners of 
the grave, and our existence, which to mortal gaze 
seemed but a vapor, expands itself through all the 
ranges of eternity till it hides itself with Christ in 
God. There is our cause, the great, the first, the 
uncaused Cause; and because he lives I shall live 
also. 

This great announcement contradicts no fact of 
our consciousness. On the contrary, it is one of 
the strongest proofs of the divine origin of such 
statements that they fit themselves completely to 
our whole moral nature. Before life and immor- 
tality were brought to light in the Gospel men were 
thinking and longing to know these great things to 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 105 

be true. This is the theme of all the ages. This is 
what men have seen afar off; have embraced by 
faith with unutterable joy. They could not reason 
from their consciousness that it was true and would 
be realized. But when at last the good news is 
brought, when the fact is set forth in the world in 
tangible form, when every law of evidence is satis- 
fied in its support, men cannot be restrained from 
giving voice to their conviction that it must be true 
because it is the very echo of their thought. We 
cannot think this thing incredible, there is nothing 
in us to dispute it. Experience is satisfied because 
the new knowledge is assimilated with the old ; rea- 
son is content because the testimony bears the most 
rigid scrutiny; and consciousness whispers back 
glad antiphony to the cloud of witnesses chanting 
the song of immortality. Our whole nature rises 
to meet it and salute it. At last the glass is taken 
away and we see face to face ; we know even as we 
are known. "Lo, this is our God ; we have waited 
for him, and he will save us : this is the Lord ; we 
will be glad and rejoice in his salvation." 



yi 

THE CREDENTIAL OF MIEACLE 



"God also bearing them witness, both with signs 
and wonders, and with divers miracles. "^Hebrews 
ii,4. 



VI 



THE CREDENTIAL OF MIRACLE 

The credentials we have examined thus far have 
not differed in their nature from the ordinary evi- 
dence by which matters of fact are usually estab- 
lished. To a certain extent we have up to this 
point brought forward the same kind of evidence 
we would have used if we had been investigating 
the claims of Herodotus or Homer. We have found 
the book an ancient, genuine book ; the writers true 
witnesses, and the statements credible. At the 
same time we have not overlooked the fact that 
while these credentials may not be called divine as 
to their nature, yet because in their degree they 
rise above the same kind of evidence as applied 
elsewhere they are to be called divine. It is won- 
derful how ancient this book is, how true these wit- 
nesses are and how credible these statements seem. 
So wonderful, in fact, that it seems necessary to 
assume a divine direction if not a divine origin to 
fully account for them. But manifestly we are 
still at the threshold of this undertaking. We have 
been standing outside marking the bulwarks and 
telling the towers. Now, however, the time has 

109 



110 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

come for us to enter and survey this book from 
within. We begin with this chapter the considera- 
tion of those credentials which God himself has 
given and which are therefore divine in their na- 
ture; and the first of these is the Credential of 
Miracle. 

1. In the discussion of the credential of miracle 
we shall begin by attempting to form a definition 
of what we are to understand a miracle to be from 
the nature of the case. The New Testament de- 
clares that God has borne witness to the authority 
of the writers of the Bible "by signs and wonders 
and divers miracles." These names all refer to the 
same thing. The argument is that certain persons 
claiming to have God's authority for what they said 
were enabled to exhibit a power so great and so 
unusual that men were compelled to believe that 
they had received it from God ; and that in this way 
God bore witness to them as his representatives. 

We understand, of course, that a miracle is a 
work of some kind; it is something done; it is the 
exhibition of power to produce an effect. And we 
also understand that whatever exhibition of power 
is made in our world must be made upon those ob- 
jects which constitute what we call nature. For 
even divine power, while of course not restricted 
in its field of operations generally, must be limited 
to this world to enable us to see it and judge of it. 
Now we have grown accustomed to the display of 
forces in this world in certain directions and with 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 111 

certain intensity; which we do not understand, it is 
true, but which are yet familiar to us and which we 
call the uniformity of nature. If therefore God de- 
signs to make a display of power to call our atten- 
tion to his special intervention it is manifest that 
he would choose to produce an effect different from 
what we are accustomed to and which none of our 
experience would enable us to explain ; because this 
is the sort of work which would be certain to excite 
our attention and force us to acknowledge the pres- 
ence of a superhuman and supernatural power. 
This then is the effect we are to look for in the Bible 
to answer the purpose proposed. 

2. Opening our Bibles we read the account of 
numerous events which answer to the above de- 
scription in a most remarkable way. We find ef- 
fects produced upon nature in every conceivable 
form, and all of them witnessing to causes different 
from any we know. I shall venture even at the risk 
of being tedious to go over these works somewhat in 
detail; for it will assist us much in forming a 
proper estimate of the significance of miracles to 
know how varied these works are and to observe 
that no part of nature has been left unmarked by 
God's testifying finger. 

The ancients were accustomed to regard nature 
as made up of four elements, out of which they sup- 
posed all matter had been formed. These were air, 
fire, water and earth. All these elements are the 
subjects of miracles in the Bible. The pillar of 



112 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

cloud and fire in the wilderness, the sudden blaze 
of light about Paul as he went to Damascus; the 
thick darkness in Egypt lasting three days; the 
rising wind about the ship carrying Jonah and the 
sudden calm when he was cast out; and the more 
remarkable display under the direction of Jesus' 
personal command, are instances of miracles in the 
air. Of miracles in fire we have the destruction of 
Nadab and Abihu; of the people who complained 
in the wilderness and of the two companies sent 
cut to take Elijah. We have this same agent ren- 
dered harmless against the three HebreAV children ; 
we see it descending from heaven at the word of 
David and of Solomon and of Elijah; and it sits 
upon the apostles in token of the power of heaven- 
born utterance. Miracles in water begin with the 
deluge; the Eed Sea and the Jordan are divided at 
a word; Jesus walks on the waves; Elijah holds 
back the rain and brings it again by prayer ; Moses 
turns water into blood, Jesus turns it into wine. 
The rock is smitten with a staff and the thirst of 
Israel satisfied ; and Moses with a tree, Elijah with 
a cruse of salt makes bitter waters sweet. God's 
power over the earth is manifested in cleaving the 
ground asunder to swallow up Korah and in earth- 
quakes wrought at the death of Jesus and for the 
deliverance of the apostles in prison. 

Again we may think of nature as divided into 
kingdoms ; and we shall find in the vegetable king- 
dom the miracle of Aaron's rod that budded, of 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 113 

Jonah's gourd that came up in a night and perished 
in a night, and of the withered fig tree. We shall 
see many miracles in the animal kingdom, such as 
the great fish that swallowed Jonah and afterwards 
cast him out upon dry land; of the miraculous 
draught of fishes at the word of Jesus ; the plagues 
sent upon Pharaoh of frogs and lice and flies and 
locusts; the ravens taught to feed Elijah; the lions 
that touched not Daniel, and the ass that reproved 
Balaam. When we turn to man we find miracles 
most abundant. Almost everything pertaining to 
man has been the subject of divine work. Food has 
been sent to him miraculously and raiment has been 
miraculously preserved. He has been punished 
with sudden deprivation of sight, speech, strength 
and reason, and these gifts have been as marvel- 
ously restored. He has been miraculously cured 
of plague, pestilence, leprosy, palsy, fever, lame- 
ness, paralysis, dropsy and poison. He has been 
smitten with sudden death, as Pharaoh's first-born, 
Lot's wife, Ananias and Sapphira, Herod and the 
multitudes under Moses and David; and he has 
been raised from, the dead, as Elijah and Elisha 
and Peter and Paul and Jesus demonstrated in 
their ministry. 

So far as human experience goes the objects on 
which these works are performed are familiar to 
us; and some of the works themselves are not un- 
usual. For instance, a sudden storm of wind suc- 
ceeded by a sudden calm, a destructive plague, an 



114 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

earthquake, sudden death and recovery from af- 
flictive maladies are things we constantly see about 
us. Such works become miraculous when man is 
unable to connect their apparent cause with the 
result as an adequate cause. And I do not thereby 
admit that one generation may thus call miraculous 
what another might be able to account for as purely 
natural. It must be a work that man as man and 
possessing only human knowledge cannot account 
for. We know, for example, many causes of pesti- 
lence which our fathers did not know. We are 
constantly learning how to prevent and cure dis- 
eases which formerly were thought incurable. But 
it is to be carefully observed that the amount of 
our learning is always in the direction of applying 
causes sufficient to produce the designed effect. We 
do not understand the connection between a rod 
in a man's hand and a plague that comes and goes 
as that rod is waved towards heaven any better 
than Pharaoh did. We have seen blindness and 
deafness cured, but we have not seen them cured 
by a simple word or by a touch of the hand, and we 
cannot conceive of any power in these things alone 
sufficient to produce such a result. We have seen 
men resuscitated after apparent death, but there is 
always the application of efficient means to reach 
this result. If we had seen drowning men recov- 
ered every day by the usual method, it would be no 
less miraculous to us to see a man brought back to 
consciousness not by rubbing and artificial respira- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 115 

tion and so on, but by a man standing over him and 
telling him to arise and walk. The question there- 
fore is not whether the people before whoni these 
works were done were ignorant and credulous and 
mistook natural results or sleight-of-hand perform- 
ances for miracles, but whether the Bible contains 
accounts of things done by agencies which are to us 
as inexplicable as they were to the ancients, and 
which we know have no natural connection w T ith 
their causes so far as we know anything certainly 
about nature. 

The bare catalogue we have given, incomplete as 
it is, sets forth an array of events that answer this 
question triumphantly. It would be far from the 
limited range of this discourse to undertake to 
show here that each of these events is entitled to 
rank as a genuine miracle. But the tests first pro- 
posed by Leslie in his "Christianity Demonstrated" 
may be readily applied by anyone and it is impos- 
sible to see how their sufficiency can be denied. 
These tests are, "1. That the fact be such as men's 
outward senses can judge of. 2. That it be per- 
formed in the presence of witnesses. 3. That there 
be public monuments and actions kept up in mem- 
ory of it. 4. That such monuments and actions be 
established and commence at the time of the fact." 
The first two prevent the generation in which the 
events occur from being imposed upon, and the last 
two equally protect future generations. To one 
who will apply these tests to the events I have cited 



116 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

it is impossible to question the reality and the won- 
derful character of these works. And it is impos- 
sible to believe the record and not believe that these 
works are outside the range of human power. And 
to believe this is to believe that God has interposed 
his power and that these works are his witnesses. 

3. We must now turn for further instruction 
to the names by which these works are designated. 
The name with which we are most familiar is mira- 
cle, but it is not the name most frequently used in 
the Bible, nor is it by any means the most signifi- 
cant. In fact, much of the meaning of these events 
is obscured by translating several different words 
of the original by the same English word, miracle, 
and by using other English words to translate the 
word in the original most nearly identical with our 
word miracle. According to the derivation, mira- 
cle means that which startles the beholder and is 
identical with wonder. In the text what are called 
"wonders" should be called "miracles," and instead 
of "divers miracles" we should read "divers works" 
or "manifold powers." The Revised Version reads, 
"God bearing witness with them, both by signs and 
wonders, and by manifold powers." 

It is the second name used here which contains 
the idea conveyed by the word miracle. It would 
be wide of the true intent of these works if we only 
thought of them as wonders, as if their only effect 
was to make men stare. But yet undoubtedly this 
is one of the offices of miracles. God's purpose in 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 117 

visiting men is to awaken them from the lethargy 
of sin ; to startle them out of their stagnation in a 
mere material existence; to bring back to them in 
irresistible force the idea of a divine life brooding- 
over them ; and to break up the crust of custom and 
use which would shut out eternity from view. And 
so God assails men with wonders to make them 
pause and consider. It is the effort of Almighty 
Wisdom through Almighty Power to secure man's 
attention, the necessary condition preliminary to 
all instruction, and which men are so slow to give 
to realities that are invisible. 

But miracles have a fai deeper significance than 
this, as is indicated by the name which the Eevised 
Version translates "manifold powers," and by the 
name frequently occurring in the Bible, "works." 
By such words we are instructed that miracles in 
one sense are not wonders at all. Although they 
may make men who are unaccustomed to them 
stare, yet they are not isolated, unaccountable out- 
breaks of a wild force. They are, on the contrary, 
the normal exercise of powers or faculties which 
uniformly produce such results as their ordinary 
works. Thus speech in a brute would be a wonder, 
but in man it is a faculty, a natural power. So, to 
divide the sea by a word or to walk unsupported on 
its waves would be in man a wonder ; but in the Be- 
ing who made the sea by a word and who holds the 
waters in the hollow of his hand such control would 
be only a natural power. By such works God is 



118 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

trying to give men some intimation of his power, 
and the lesson is one we cannot put aside. Men of 
perverse will stand without and refuse to believe 
the record, or cavil at some incident ; but there is no 
fair way of evading the force of these mighty works. 
Such results must be accounted for; our intuition 
impels us to seek an adequate cause for them, and 
when we once enter upon the search we are led ir- 
resistibly step by step back to God. The conclusion 
of Mcodemus is the only logical conclusion, "Kabbi, 
we know that thou art a teacher sent from God; 
for no man can do these miracles that thou doest 
except God be with him." 

We have not yet reached the real intention of 
miracles, however. There is still another name, 
the one occurring most often in the Bible, and the 
most significant of all, by which we are taught to 
regard these works as signs. A few examples will 
show the meaning of these works as signs. When 
God commissioned Moses as the deliverer of Israel 
he wrought two miracles before him and gave him 
power to repeat them before Israel, saying, "If they 
will not believe thee, neither hearken to the voice of 
the first sign, they will believe the voice of the lat- 
ter sign." Again, when Elijah is about to submit 
the test on Carmel, he prays for the descending fire 
as a sign, "Let it be known this day that thou art 
God in Israel, and that I am thy servant and that I 
have done all these things at thy word." So to the 
messengers of the doubting John, Jesus said, "Go 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 119 

and show John again those things which ye do hear 
and see. The blind receive their sight, and the 
lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf 
hear, the dead are raised up and the poor have the 
Gospel preached to them." 

All this is of a piece and sets forth a natural 
order of thought. We receive the witness of men in 
support of human authority, but the witness of God 
is greater. Whoever claims to be speaking in the 
name and by the authority of God must produce 
credentials suitable to this high claim. My reason 
compels me to believe that whoever has more than 
human authority can show more than human power. 
If God is speaking by any man he will bear witness 
of that man by unmistakable signs. Thus it is that 
while a human science is sufficiently accredited 
by merely human testimony, a divine science 
could never be. Let those who object to the pres- 
ence of miracles in the Bible or to laying emphasis 
on them in proving the authority of the Bible con- 
sider how any immediate instruction from God 
could be possible without a miracle; or how, sup- 
posing it to be given, men could ever assure them- 
selves of it. It is possible to rest in the sign and 
not go on to the thing signified which is greater, 
and perhaps some have magnified the miraculous 
at the expense of the saving power of Bible truth. 
But the fact remains that to put away miracles 
from the Bible leaves us without a sign by which we 
may know that it is divine. This is God's witness. 



120 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

Many other signs corroborate this, but every ele- 
ment of the conviction we have that this is God's 
book goes back finally somewhere to a miracle, and 
it goes back there by force of the conviction, we 
might almost say intuition, we have that if God 
speaks God a] so bears witness. 

4. In studying this credential we may receive 
valuable aid in understanding its significance by 
observing its occasions. We might expect that such 
great facts would not be without significance; but 
we are to go deeper than this and observe that as 
these things are said to be done by God "according 
to his own will," we may expect a significance of 
order and occasion ; so that we shall not find them 
dropped here and there indiscriminately, but as 
man works on a scheme of things, much more will 
the works of God display an orderly system and 
point to a great plan. 

If the average Bible reader were asked to tell the 
number of miracles he supposes are in the Bible the 
estimate in most cases would, I think, be surpris- 
ingly different from the fact. And the difference 
would generally be in one direction; that is, the 
number would be over-estimated. For so fully have 
we come to associate miracles with the Bible that 
our general idea is that there is scarcely any other 
kind of history there. So, Bible readers, who have 
made no special observations of the subject, have a 
vague idea that one can open the Bible at random 
and find a miracle, not suspecting that like all 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 121 

God's works miracles follow a definite law and ap- 
pear only on an appropriate occasion. Let ns en- 
deavor to get the correct notion on this subject by 
examining the facts themselves with this idea to 
guide us. We have seen how miracles are distrib- 
uted over the physical world ; let us see if they have 
likewise an intellectual and moral distribution. 

There are sixty-six books in the Bible and mira- 
cles are recorded in but sixteen of them. The Bible 
history covers a period of more than four thousand 
years, touching every really great event occurring 
in the whole world during that time, and furnish- 
ing us the only information we have of the greatest 
events that have ever happened in the world ; and 
there are perhaps less than one hundred miracles 
in all these records. Two lessons may be learned 
from these facts : 

(a) God is not prodigal of his great works. 
Many who have sought a sign have had no sign 
given them ; because a miracle once given is given 
for all similar times. The sign of Jonah must serve 
for every sinful and adulterous generation. Nor 
is there anything whimsical or arbitrary in this. 
Whatever significance miracles have, they owe 
largely to their uncommonness. As an evidence of 
special interposition of God they would lose their 
peculiar force if they were simply great or even 
simply wonderful. All God's works are great and 
wonderful, and there is a sense in which it is no 
more wonderful to change water into wine instant- 



122 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

ly than to do this in the vineyard through the or- 
dinary processes of nature. It is not because the 
heavens are not telling the glory of God nor the 
earth showing forth his handiwork that we need 
miracles. But these great works of nature, full 
of wonder to the contemplative mind, lose their 
power over us by their constancy. Day unto day 
uttereth speech, but our ears are dulled by the oft 
repeated story and their voice is not heard. So it 
would be with miracles if they were as frequent. 
Hence by these mighty voices God speaks once or 
twice and then withdraws himself that in the si- 
lence we may have time to meditate on what we 
have heard and learn the lessons he has designed 
these things to teach. 

(b) The other lesson Ave may learn from the 
fact that miracles are done "according to his own 
will," is that they are part of a scheme and get 
their highest significance from their connection 
with the scheme. No one doubts, I think, that there 
is a scheme in the Bible; that it is not a mere mis- 
cellaneous collection of tracts on moral and relig- 
ious subjects. The Bible is a book, a history given 
at sundry times and in divers portions, but still a 
connected and progressive history of the redemp- 
tion of man from sin. It begins at Eden and stops 
at Calvary, and all through its varying styles and 
subjects runs the same theme. It is a collection of 
books, but they are bound together with "the scarlet 
thread of redemption." 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 123 

It is with this scheme that miracles are connect- 
ed and from this connection they get their pro- 
foundest meaning. As soon as we attempt to class- 
ify the miracles in periods of time we notice that 
they fall into three great groups; and a little closer 
study reveals to us that these are not mere points 
of time but epochs in the history of redemption. 
One-fourth of all the miracles recorded in the Bible 
were performed by Moses; an equal number by 
Elijah and his successor, Elisha; and one-third of 
them by Jesus. It would lead me too far to elabo- 
rate the thought and I must leave you to read the 
history for yourself. But you will have no diffi- 
culty in seeing that the three greatest personages 
in the history of redemption were Moses, Elijah 
and Jesus. You will see how each of these per- 
formed a different part in the progress of this 
scheme; Moses giving it its first organization by 
means of a national church, Elijah bringing it back 
purified and spiritualized from its apostacy under 
Ahab, so that in one day the whole nation threw 
off Baal and returned to Jehovah, and Jesus ap- 
pearing in due time to consummate that which had 
thus been begun and preserved. And you will see 
that each of these epochs was introduced and each 
of these persons testified to by a brilliant display of 
supernatural works to emphasize before men the or- 
ganization, the reformation and the consummation 
of the human organization for redemption. These 
periods are separated by intervals of five hundred 



124 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

years between Moses and Elijah and nine hundred 
years between Elijah and Christ, yet they are most 
intimately associated. Moses testified, "A prophet 
shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your 
brethren like unto me" ; and these words the apos- 
tles applied to Christ. The last prophecy of the 
Old Testament declared, "Behold, I will send you 
Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great 
and dreadful day of the Lord," and Jesus: applied 
these words to John the Baptist. Finally, on the 
mountain of Transfiguration, when the decease 
which Jesus should accomplish at Jerusalem was 
in full view and the sublime meaning of redemp- 
tion was first unfolded on this earth, these three 
meet again, Moses, Elijah and Jesus, and the glory 
of a finished redemption shines upon them out of 
heaven and they see of the travail of their soul and 
are satisfied. 

I trust I may not raise in your minds a suspicion 
that I am simply setting forth a clever combination 
of facts from the record. Most profoundly do I be- 
lieve this to be a divine order and I stop in awe be- 
fore it. And if you will consider who these per- 
sons were, what offices they filled in the scheme to 
save the world, and then add the thought that of 
the whole number of recorded miracles five-sixths 
are attributed to them, it cannot seem to you a mere 
coincidence of history or anything less than a part 
of a divine scheme. 

Then you will begin to see the real significance of 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 125 

miracles. It will appear to you the only reason- 
able conclusion, that as redemption from sin is the 
most sublime scheme ever proposed to mortal at- 
tention it must be heralded, confirmed and consum- 
mated by the most stupendous display of power 
and wisdom mortals ever beheld; that as only God 
could conceive so great a thought so none but he 
could put that thought into fitting speech and deed. 
And from this, if you will, you may rise to catch a 
view of the grand climacteric of miracle. You will 
see that miracles witness to more than divine 
power; you will not stand amazed and affrighted 
at these works as though they were the comets of 
the moral world ; you will not be troubled that some 
of them seem destructive and punitive; you will not 
be disturbed at the prospect of mistaking a false 
miracle for a real. Oh, my soul thrills as I catch 
a glimpse of this great thing. I think I know what 
miracle means. It is not wonder alone, not power 
alone, not wisdom alone, not divinity alone. Mira- 
cle means redemption. It bears witness through 
all ages, through Moses and Elijah and Jesus, to 
Almighty power subserving great and beneficent 
ends. It has been given to win men to listen to 
One who "speaks in righteousness, mighty to save." 
Miracle means love ; for Jesus himself is the repre- 
sentative miracle of the ages and "he loved me and 
gave himself for me." 



VII 
THE CREDENTIAL OF PROPHECY 



"For the prophecy came not in old time by the 
will of man; bnt holy men of God spake as they 
were moved by the Holy Ghost." — 2 Peter i ? 21. 



VII 

THE CREDENTIAL OF PROPHECY 

This verse expresses the fact on which, we base 
another credential to the divine authority of the 
Bible and furnishes the reason why the statements 
of men who were able to announce prophecies are 
to be accepted as signs of a wisdom superior to any 
possessed by man. The translation of the Kevised 
Version is somewhat stronger : "For no prophecy 
ever came by the will of man ; but men spake from 
God, being moved by the Holy Ghost." 

The discussion of miracles renders it unnecessary 
to emphasize the general character of this argu- 
ment, since the evidence from Prophecy is of the 
same nature as that from miracles. Prophecy is a 
display of supernatural wisdom as miracles are of 
supernatural power. One expresses itself in word, 
the other in deed, but both alike declare God to be 
their author, and the man who can furnish either 
thereby gives the best possible evidence that he is 
God's messenger and is upheld by divine authority. 
If, therefore, we find in the Bible instances of gen- 
uine prophecy; displays of wisdom that forbid the 
explanation of a purely human origin; knowledge 

129 



130 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

of the future as impossible to man as the power to 
overcome natural forces ; then we are forced to con- 
clude that God and not man is the real author of 
such prophecies, and they are to be attended to ac- 
cordingly. 

But there is an important difference to be noted 
in the evidence from miracle and from prophecy. 
The demonstration which miracles offer in support 
of supernatural authority is immediate and over- 
whelming; that of prophecy is postponed and may 
be more easily ignored by its direct recipients. 
Hence the evidence of miracles will always be 
strongest upon eye-witnesses and will inevitably 
tend to become weaker to succeeding generations. 
I do not admit it will ever become weak enough to 
be disregarded or even fail to be conclusive; yet 
certainly a miracle can never have the same effect 
upon us who receive its testimony as if we had seen 
it done ; there is always a certain emotion missing. 
On the other hand, the evidence from prophecy is 
weakest when uttered and strengthens with every 
succeeding age as it progresses towards fulfillment. 

We saw how necessary it was to the proper force 
of a miracle that it should not be often repeated. 
This would limit the strongest conviction to the 
few T who were eye-witnesses of miracles. But in 
prophecy God has been pleased to give us a source 
of conviction which is practically unlimited in 
range. We did not hear the prophecy uttered, but 
the record has been preserved for us, and as the 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 131 

event gradually discloses itself we become, as it 
were, eye-witnesses of a miracle; and as the true 
significance of the record is learned we become 
sure that this, too, is the finger of God. 

The method of our discussion will also have to 
be changed to suit another fact. It is comparative- 
ly easy to draw up a list of the miracles and then 
by an inductive examination determine the charac- 
ter and significance of a miracle. But, as we shall 
notice later, this is impracticable with prophecy. 
Nor can this be said to be necessary. Miracles dif- 
fer as the objects on which they are performed dif- 
fer, but the object of all prophecy is the same ; it is 
a foresight of human events ; and perception of one 
event does not differ from perception of another 
event as perception. Our method, then, will be to 
try to discover by reason the true marks of 
prophecy and to test a few of the prophecies of the 
Bible by these marks. 

1. We may say in general that prophecy is the 
foretelling of a future event. But we see at once 
that some modification of this definition is neces- 
sary and certain things will have to be excluded. 
The very power of thought itself is in a measure a 
foretelling. No man thinks at all without in some 
measure going beyond himself and beyond his sur- 
roundings. Thus there is a sort of thinking we 
call guessing ; as when I say of a certain day that it 
will be fair, or that the next person I meet will be 
so many years old, it is evident I am within the 



132 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

limits of possibility, for every day must be fair or 
foul and every person has some age ; and my guess 
has therefore a chance to be confirmed. Yet even 
this event would carry no conviction as to my wis- 
dom, for it is clear that there is no perception on 
my part at all. The astronomer foretells a future 
event when he fixes the day and hour for an eclipse, 
but this is only a use of mathematical data which 
any man may learn to use. It is possible to fore- 
tell what a given man will do under certain circum- 
stances, not by the gift of prophecy, but simply 
from a knowledge of human nature. The detective 
overmatches the criminal in this way and goes 
straight to his hiding-place, guided by no outward 
signs, but solely by his knowledge of what men usu- 
ally do under such circumstances. A wide knowl- 
edge of history may make men wise in forecasting 
political events, guided by the signs of the times. 
Chesterfield traveled in France twenty years be- 
fore the Revolution and predicted its approach. 
Many of our own statesmen foretold our Civil War 
years before it actually broke out. But we do not 
credit such men with prophetic power. We see in 
such foresight nothing that cannot be explained by 
purely human wisdom. They are wiser than many 
other men, but they are not wiser than man. 

Let us endeavor then to &x upon the character- 
istics that distinguish this special act of the wis- 
dom of God from all human wisdom, and in doing 
so let us at the same time inquire if there are 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 133 

prophecies in the Bible which illustrate these char- 
acteristics and thus prove them to be the wisdom of 
God. 

2. The divine character of prophecy is indicated 
by the distance from the speaker into which the ful- 
fillment is projected. We may not be able to say 
definitely how far into the future man can see or 
guess, but we know very well how far he cannot 
see. Such data as men can command may avail 
one man to wider purpose than another; but we 
can easily fix a limit beyond which they will not 
avail any man ; and when we are forced beyond that 
limit we have no difficulty in concluding that God 
alone knows. 

As an instance showing this characteristic we 
might mention the very first prophecy of the Bible, 
that the seed of the woman should bruise the ser- 
pent's head. This seems to be so distinct and un- 
equivocal a promise of a Kedeemer that hardly any 
have been found to question that this was its inten- 
tion. That the promise was fulfilled in the birth, 
ministry, death and resurrection of Jesus is now 
believed by the civilized world. Yet these two are 
separated by four thousand years. And we may 
say generally that as the latest Old Testament book 
was written about four hundred years before the 
birth of Christ all the prophecies referring to that 
event may be reckoned as at least that far removed 
from their fulfillment, although many of them are 
undoubtedly much older. 



134 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

As another instance of the same characteristic 
we may take the prophecy of the dying Jacob with 
reference to his son Judah, "The sceptre shall not 
depart from Judah nor a lawgiver from between his 
feet until Shiloh come." A large number of schol- 
ars hold that by Shiloh is meant the Messiah, and 
it seems difficult to fix any other definite meaning 
to it. But even aside from that interpretation the 
prophecy certainly fixes upon a future event very 
far removed and very unlikely. It was two hundred 
years after this prophecy before anyone could bear 
a sceptre in Israel, because it was that long before 
Israel became a nation. Judah was not the first- 
born of Jacob, whose right was never disputed 
among the ancients. It was six hundred years be- 
fore Israel had its first king, and he was not from 
Judah. The sceptre did, however, finally come to 
Judah, and it remained there until the birth of 
Christ. Through all the wonderful changes in the 
fortunes of the Jewish people, when tribes were 
broken up, carried into captivity and their identity 
destroyed, Judah alone retained its distinct posi- 
tion ; and Mary and Joseph could trace their geneal- 
ogy back to this tribe. But after Christ came this 
tribe also was broken up, and no Jew at this day 
can tell what tribe he belongs to. The sceptre has 
at last departed from Judah. 

This is what we mean by saying that prophecy 
projects its fulfillment so far from its utterance as 
to make it impossible for man to pretend to it. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 135 

Some glimpse into the future he may gain with in- 
credible labor, but this has only the resemblance to 
prophecy that the works of the magicians had to 
the miracles of Moses. For a time men may imi- 
tate, but the reach of the wonder finally paralyzes 
their efforts and forces them to exclaim, "This is 
the finger of God." 

3. Prophecy will also be distinguished from 
every kind of guessing by repeating its activities 
and multiplying its declarations in such a way as 
to make it absurd to attribute it to mere coincidence 
or to anything resulting from human ingenuity. 

Suppose I were to undertake to tell what number 
will be the first to be drawn from a box containing 
a hundred separate numbers, and succeed. This 
does not prove me to be a prophet; because it is 
evident some one of the numbers had to be drawn 
and the number I named was as likely to be drawn 
as any. But suppose I succeed in naming also the 
second number to be drawn, and then the third and 
the fourth, and so on through the series. There is 
no man living who would not acknowledge, if he 
was convinced there was no fraud, that I possessed 
more than human knowledge. For this is a case 
where the first attempt does not lessen the difficulty 
of succeeding the second time but vastly increases 
it. The probabilities that I will name the first num- 
ber are as one hundred to one ; but the probabilities 
that I will name the second are as ninety-nine hun- 
dred to one, and the third, ninety-eight times nine- 



136 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

ty-nine hundred to one. Bo prophecy has removed 
itself entirely from the realm of chance or specula- 
tion by giving so many instances of its power. 

It is exactly opposed to miracle in this respect. 
One act of power definitely proved is as conclusive 
as a million, for there is no room for the element 
of chance. But when prediction is limited it can 
never be certain that the event was foreknown be- 
cause it occurred ; something had to occur and that 
particular event had its even chance with the oth- 
ers. Hence the Bible contains a limited number 
of miracles, while it is full of prophecies. The 
Jews saw this perhaps more distinctly than we 
do. They divided the Bible into "The Law, the 
Prophets and the Psalms," thus indicating that all 
the Bible except the first five and the poetical books 
was prophecy. All the books from Joshua to Kings, 
which we call historical, they styled "The Former 
Prophets/' not only because prophets wrote them, 
but because they regarded the whole history of 
Israel as a prophecy of the kingdom of God. 

But aside from this every one must see how large 
a portion of the Bible is in its whole form and con- 
tent prophetic. For a period of four hundred 
years, or a time equal to that between Chaucer and 
Wordsworth, which comprises the body of English 
literature ; a period of unparalleled vigor and splen- 
dor in the history of Israel, everything that was 
written in Israel was prophecy. And in the great 
works of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Daniel, as 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 137 

well as the smaller works of tlie twelve, called 
minor prophets, we have a collection of predictions 
so large, so varied and so exact that the mind is 
overwhelmed in attempting to grasp and follow 
them. 

It is simply impossible to regard such a body of 
literature as without system or law ; the element of 
chance is wholly eliminated. And when we con- 
sider its variety and exactness of detail the same 
impression is made. Nations and cities and indi- 
viduals are all treated with fullness and in detail. 
Sometimes the name of a prince is foretold a hun- 
dred years before he is born ; sometimes a kingdom 
is announced to rise whose beginnings no man can 
see, or flourishing cities are denounced and doomed 
while yet in full vigor. Everywhere there is a 
breadth of comprehension and a boldness of outline 
which forces upon us the conviction that these men 
are speaking by no chance or guess, but only by the 
very wisdom of God. 

4. The divine character of prophecy will be seen 
again in the fact that it is impossible to account 
for the foreknowledge of the events by any percep- 
tion of causes leading up to them. 

We have already intimated that some results 
might be unexpected to the ignorant which to those 
familiar with causes would be no surprise at all. 
A father's experience enables him to foresee clearly 
what result a given course of action in his son will 
lead to, which to the son may seem not only remote 



138 DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 

but impossible. The breaking out of war between 
France and Germany in 1870 took the world by 
surprise, but statesmen knew very well it must 
come; and the rulers of Germany kept a plan of 
campaign on file for years preceding the event. But 
no knowledge of economic laws, no mathematical 
calculations of the balance of power, no perception 
of causes hidden away but working on towards re- 
sults can account for or describe the knowledge 
possessed by the prophets of Scripture, because they 
foretell events sometimes in direct contravention 
of known causes, sometimes long before any cause 
could possibly be in existence to bring the events 
to pass, and sometimes the prophecy is as much a 
prediction of new causes as of new results. 

When Isaiah sent word unto Hezekiah respecting 
the King of Assyria, at that time the mightiest 
monarch of the earth, who had come up with his 
army against Jerusalem, "Behold I will send a blast 
upon him, and he shall hear a rumor, and return 
to his own land," he foretold the defeat of Jeru- 
salem's enemy in direct contravention of all known 
causes. For what could be more improbable than 
that a king, flushed with unbroken successes, should 
besiege a small city with a great army and suddenly 
abandon the siege and rush away in a panic, not 
because of a disastrous battle, nor the discov- 
ery of unexpected strength in his antagonist, but 
because of a blast and a rumor? Yet so it came to 
pass: 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 139 

"And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the 

sword, 
Had melted like snow in the glance of the Lord." 

One more instance will illustrate the other two 
points of difference between prophecy and the per- 
ception of causes Avhich I have mentioned. I shall 
take only one among many similar prophecies, be- 
cause it is impossible to do more than suggest the 
answer in these cases : the prediction concerning 
the overthrow of Babylon. This was one of the 
greatest cities of antiquity, sixty miles in compass, 
having walls three hundred and fifty feet high and 
more than eighty feet thick, pierced by a hundred 
gates of solid brass. Its beauty and grandeur and 
political importance made it one of the seven won- 
ders of the world. At the time the prophecies were 
uttered against it Nebuchadnezzar was its king, one 
of the greatest statesmen and warriors of all time, 
and he had brought the kingdom to a height of 
prosperity and greatness such as rendered any sug- 
gestion of ruin improbable and absurd. It is at 
this time that its destruction is foretold. The 
name of the conqueror is given, the manner of its 
capture is foretold even to the most unusual cir- 
cumstance that the river Euphrates should be dried 
up and the city taken by surprise while the king 
and inhabitants were revelling. All this was fore- 
told one hundred and fifty years before it came to 
pass, when both the direct instrument and the sec- 



140 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

ondary causes were unborn. How could any states- 
manship or knowledge of history provide such de- 
tails as these? For the fact is to be borne in mind 
that this is not a general prophecy of decline such 
as might be ventured against any kingdom on the 
supposition that sooner or later all human king- 
doms must come to their overthrow. It is a specific 
statement, fixing an event within definite limits, 
and connecting it with a particular individual. 
Everything is hazarded on a name and a date and a 
method. There can be no room here for a sugges- 
tion that there is a perception of cause and effect. 
Both are equally hidden from merely human wis- 
dom and only he who can do such things is able to 
make them known before they come to pass. Well 
might God offer this single instance as the triumph- 
ant proof of omniscience and challenge all false 
gods to produce the like. "Who hath declared this 
from ancient time? Who hath told it from that 
time? Have not I, the Lord? and there is no God be- 
side me, a just God and a saviour." 

5. The last mark to be noticed by which proph- 
ecy is distinguished as divine is its scope; embrac- 
ing such widely different times and conditions ; so 
grasping the threads of all history and issuing its 
mandate over all contingencies as to make it im- 
possible to think of it as any smaller than the scope 
of the world, or its author as any less than the om- 
nipresent and omniscient God. 

You remember that I characterized the Bible in 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 141 

the last chapter as the revelation of a scheme of 
human redemption wherein miracles found appro- 
priate place at certain epochs. This scheme comes 
out still more clearly when we attempt to read the 
prophecies in their order. It might be extreme to 
say that every prediction of the Old Testament is 
a direct prophecy of Christ, but certainly no one 
can deny that the great burden of all prophecy is 
the coming of Messiah, for "to him," says Peter, 
"give all the prophets witness," 

The very first prophecy is of a coming Christ; 
and after four thousand years of continued prom- 
ise and fulfillment the last prophecy, which is the 
last word of revelation, still promises a coming 
Christ to reign over those he has redeemed forever. 
Between these two flaming signals stretches a long 
line of prophetic stars of varying lustre and mag- 
nificence, but all bending their light on this one 
event and finally converging in the star that "came 
and stood over where the young child was." Con- 
sider a few of these prophecies out of a great num- 
ber, certainly more than one hundred directly re- 
lating to this one person : that he was to be of the 
seed of David ; born of a virgin ; born in Bethlehem ; 
God and man; a great teacher; a great healer; re- 
jected and apparently defeated; arraigned on false 
charges ; betrayed by one of his own disciples ; sold 
for thirty pieces of silver; denied justice; put to a 
violent death; buried in another man's tomb; and 
from thence rising from the dead and ascending to 



142 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

heaven. This is not an abstract of history taken 
from the New Testament; it is the imperfect sum- 
mary of what was seen and definitely foretold hun- 
dreds of years before the New Testament was writ- 
ten. "If only one single man/' says Home, "had 
left a book of predictions concerning Jesus Christ, 
and had distinctly and precisely marked out the 
time, place, manner and other circumstances of his 
advent, life, doctrine, death, resurrection and as- 
cension ; a series of prophecies so astounding, so cir- 
cumstanced, so connected, would be the most won- 
derful thing in the world, and would have infinite 
weight. But the miracle is far greater ; for here is 
a succession of men for four thousand years who 
were widely separated from each other by time and 
place, yet who regularly and without any variation 
succeeded one another to foretell the same event. 
Here, therefore, the hand of God is manifest. " 

To this observation of Home should be added 
that not only are these prophecies widely separated 
in time and place, but the variety of events included 
in their scope is equally wonderful. To set forth 
the mission of this Messiah all history has been 
made tributary and no event common to men has 
been left untaxed. One sees him in the glory of 
Israel's kingdom; another in the judgment upon 
Israel's enemies. To one he is the head of the 
Church ; to another the king of the world. Births, 
marriage, war, agriculture, the rise and fall of king- 
doms, whatever men engage in, are seized upon as 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 143 

types through which the Messiah may be set forth. 
Such multiform knowledge as the perception of 
causes in all these relations would involve would be 
nothing short of a miracle, and in this we see the 
finger of God. 

It is not a mere luxuriance of rhetoric, but the 
manifestation of the same diversity of perceptive 
power that the Messiah in these prophecies should 
be set forth under so many figures, Abraham sees 
him as a lamb; Moses as a prophet; Job as a vindi- 
cator; David as a king; Isaiah as the prince of 
peace; Jeremiah as a branch; Ezekiel as a shep- 
herd ; and Daniel as the stone cut out of the moun- 
tains without hands. Like his own coming so was 
the prophecy of his coming ; it was as the lightning 
that "cometh out of the East and shineth even unto 
the West," and the stream of its glory flashed round 
the world. 

And finally there is another feature of the scope 
of prophecy which still further increases our won- 
der, and that is the way in which it has been unfold- 
ing itself to mortal view through the centuries. 
That which proves most conclusively to us the pres- 
ence of life in any organization is the constant ex- 
pansion it manifests. It is the development from 
the seed, not its size or shape, by which we judge 
whether it has life in itself. And so we should 
judge of prophecy. Taking its seed, found at the 
very beginning of the Bible, we may be interested 
by its form and some indications of power may be 



144 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

detected in it, but we must watch it grow if we 
would know its fullness; of blessing. 

Note then how this promise was renewed from 
time to time and to this and that individual ; how 
it was finally deposited with the family of Abra- 
ham; suspended for long years on the life of one 
man; then expanding slowly and under most dis- 
advantageous surroundings, among twelve breth- 
ren whose descendants were oppressed by a long 
and cruel bondage. It issues forth at last the heri- 
tage of a nation separated from all others to keep 
and develop this sacred deposit. The glory and 
prosperity of this nation seem now the goal toward 
which all has been pointing, while the power and 
splendor of an almost universal rule gather about 
the reign of its most illustrious king. But David 
himself sees beyond this and he in turn becomes the 
prophet to carry the proclamation through far- 
reaching ages to a king of whom he is but the faint 
type. National glory fades away into defeat and 
captivity, but the promise still spreads itself 
abroad. Its music seems set to a minor key, but 
prophetic voices multiply the cheering promises of 
God's great theme, until just as Israel's ruin seems 
complete and with it the hope that Israel has been 
so long carrying for the world, the full-toned dia- 
pason of God's great organ is drawn and the heath- 
en world echoes with the music of the most magnifi- 
cent outburst of prophetic song that has ever been 
given to men. Then it first begins to appear that 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 145 

not to Israel alone is this prophetic gift ; it belongs 
to the world, and its culminating glory appears not 
in Israel's elevation to dominion, but when "the 
mountain of the Lord's house shall be established 
in the top of the mountains and shall be exalted 
above the hills and all nations shall flow unto it; 
and many people shall go and say, Come ye and let 
us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house 
of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his 
ways, and we will walk in his paths ; for out of Zion 
shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord 
from Jerusalem." 

This it is that makes prophecy truly divine, its 
divine scope. "For my thoughts are not your 
thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the 
Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the 
earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and 
my thoughts than your thoughts." 



VIII 
THE CREDENTIAL OF CONSCIENCE 



"Which show the work of the law written in 
their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, 
and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else 
excusing one another." — Romans ii, 15. 



VIII 

THE CREDENTIAL OF CONSCIENCE 

In our examination of the several proofs of the 
divine origin of the Bible we have had our eyes 
opened, I trust, to many wonderful things; to 
events and characteristics both about and within 
this book such as no other book can show. We 
might rest the case here if we made no higher claim 
for the Bible than that it is the wonder of the ages. 

But the time has now come in the progress of our 
thought when it is necessary to ask a further ques- 
tion, the answer to which will furnish other creden- 
tials different from those already established, and 
which to some will appear stronger if not supreme 
proofs of its divine origin so far as that proof ap- 
peals to us. That question is, for what purpose 
was the Bible given? What results may be found 
in man and in history which must be regarded as 
the legitimate outcome of this book and which es- 
tablish its claims to a cause greater than any which 
could proceed from merely human sources? 

In asking this question it must not be supposed 
that any ground already occupied is to be given up. 
Entirely independent of this question those who 

149 



150 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

deny the divine origin and character of this book 
are compelled to account for a history, a testimony, 
a credibility and a series of marvels in power and 
wisdom which belong to the Bible and which lead 
us naturally and inevitably to the conclusion that 
this is God's book. But there are those who re- 
gard an argument of this sort as arbitrary. They 
are so constituted that they cannot accept sincerely 
and heartily an authority based merely on superior 
wisdom, much less superior power. Perhaps we 
all feel that it is more in accordance with our char- 
acter as rational beings to be influenced more by 
reason than by authority. We feel it to be un- 
worthy of God to think of him simply as a wonder- 
worker. We are convinced he does nothing for the 
sake of the thing done ; he always works to a result. 
And he means that our wonder at the act shall be 
lost in appreciation of the result. It is wonderful 
that he makes the rain to descend and the sun to 
shine and the earth to open its breast to nourish 
and multiply the seed. But, wonderful as these 
are, they are only preliminaries. By these and out 
of these he brings the consummation of a providen- 
tial purpose in nature. "He causeth the grass to 
grow for cattle, and herb for the service of man, 
that he may bring forth food out of the earth." The 
majestic procession of the seasons would be but 
parade did they not work together for so noble and 
beneficent an end. 

This is a distinct analogy to what God has done 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 151 

for man in the kingdom of grace. If he rained his 
blessings upon Israel through so many centuries 
it was not to bless Israel alone. If to this nation 
he gave the seed of his precious truth it was not 
to satisfy the hunger of Israel alone. It was for 
planting and for multiplying; that he might give 
through Israel to all who should be spiritually 
hungry everywhere the true bread which cometh 
down from heaven; "that in the ages to come he 
might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his 
kindness toward us through Christ Jesus." 

We have a right, then, to go beyond every proof 
offered to show that the Bible is divine by a con- 
sideration of what it is in itself, and show that this 
character of divinity is demonstrated in the results 
it produces. It is upon this stage of the discussion 
we now enter, and the remaining chapters will be 
occupied with the effort to show that the work of 
the Bible is consistent with what we have already 
established as the character of the Bible; that here, 
too, we are in the realm of the supernatural and 
may hear mighty voices proclaiming the Bible to be 
the Word of God. Our present topic is a consider- 
ation of the work of the Bible on the natural man. 

The argument of the passage with which the text 
is connected is that God is not unjust in the pun- 
ishment of wrongdoing. The law was given to 
Israel, but this did not excuse Israel from obedience 
to the law, "for not the hearers of the law but the 
doers are justified." The law was not given to the 



152 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

Gentiles, but neither did this excuse the Gentiles, 
for although without law in the sense of a written 
code, they were not altogether without law. They 
had law in their own natures, law that they recog- 
nized and acted upon both in judging their own 
acts and in judging the acts of others, the law of 
conscience. The Gentiles were not to be punished 
for disobeying a code such as Israel possessed and 
which was unknown to the Gentiles; but for dis- 
obeying the law written by the same God in their 
hearts and whose authority they recognized. 

It is to explain this last part of the argument 
that the Apostle pauses to inject the words of the 
text, to the effect that the Gentiles, although de- 
prived of the Ten Commandments and the explana- 
tory history and the elaborate and illustrating rit- 
ual of Israel, did yet in fact have a law. "For when 
the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature 
the things contained in the law, these, having not 
the law, are a law unto themselves ; which shew the 
work of the law written in their hearts, their con- 
science also bearing witness, and their thoughts the 
meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another." 

Out of this argument we extract the thought that 
a real and true revelation of God's will has been 
made to all men; to some by means of a written 
code ; but also to these and to all besides these by 
means of God's revelations to the individual con- 
science and by his impressions of moral rectitude 
upon the constitution of human nature. The use 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 153 

we propose to make of this thought is to show how 
the Bible, claiming to be God's book, corresponds 
with the deliverances of human nature on these 
same themes ; and thus the law in the Bible is a re- 
production of the law in the human conscience. 
And since we know that the law of conscience is 
not our law, neither were we taught it by man, it 
must follow that this same law as reproduced in 
the Bible is above human wisdom and authority. 

It is a familiar statement of universal accept- 
ance that all men everywhere have some sort of re- 
ligion. Man has been called, in fact, a religious 
animal, the better to distinguish him from all other 
orders of creation. For while there are indications 
in other animals of that which is very much like 
reason, nowhere do we find anything approaching 
to that religious nature which is found in man. 

If any proof were needed of the universality of 
these religious tendencies or instincts in man it 
might be produced by three methods: 

We might resort to the historical method, and 
show that no tribe has yet been discovered in which 
these tendencies are lacking. 

Or, we might use the dialectic method and prove 
that it is necessary to assume a religious tendency 
or capacity in man to account for the acceptance of 
religious truth. In its very nature education is a 
process of evolution. We could not have religious 
ideas put into us unless there was some prior ca- 
pacity there; and we could not develop religious 



154 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

ideas unless these ideas corresponded to something 
already in our nature. It would be impossible to 
teach the theory of color to one who is deprived of 
the sense by which color is perceived ; or music to 
one who lacks the sense of sound or rhythm ; or the 
simplest truths of mathematics to one who had no 
intuition of number. And so a revelation from 
heaven upon religious themes, however supported 
by supernatural signs, could gain no admittance 
into minds entirely destitute of religious capacity 
for the same reason ; there would be nothing to ap- 
peal to. It would be impossible to make the sim- 
plest terms understood or to develop the simplest 
ideas of religion if man were a creature who had 
first to be taught what religion was. The soil needs 
seed for a harvest, but it is equally true that the 
seed needs soil. 

I prefer to either of these arguments, however, 
the method of proof which consists in an examina- 
tion of our nature as we know it, and I believe we 
shall find this the simplest, the most direct and the 
most cogent. To look into our own nature as we 
know it is to interrogate consciousness ; and when 
we inquire of this great reservoir of all our knowl- 
edge we may discover quite easily that there are 
two distinct kinds of knowledge in us. Much, if 
not most, of what we know has come out of expe- 
rience ; we have learned it by instruction from oth- 
ers or by our own contact with the facts themselves. 
But while this sort of knowledge forms the largest 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 155 

part of the thoughts we are conscious of and occu- 
pies with most of us much the greater part of our 
attention, yet we all are quite sure of thoughts 
which we have not received in this way at all. And 
the most ignorant of us can easily, and in fact do 
constantly, make the distinction between that part 
of consciousness which has been filled by what I 
have called experience, and another part which ex- 
perience has had nothing to do with ; we were never 
taught it by others and we never learned it, but it 
has always been in consciousness. In this part of 
consciousness all men are alike. It requires civili- 
zation and education and wealth to develop man in 
the sciences, and so in respect of these men differ 
greatly. But in respect of this other knowledge 
men do not differ at all, for it is part of that which 
makes them men. I will not stop to describe these 
items of knowledge, which we call intuitive, be- 
cause they are seen directly and without proof, but 
I will direct your attention at once to that part of 
consciousness which we call conscience, where are 
found the most important of these intuitive truths, 
at least so far as they concern our present inquiry. 
To say that every man intuitively distinguishes 
between right and wrong, and that, upon making 
this distinction, he immediately has a conviction 
for which he can give no reason that he ought to do 
the right and shun the wrong, is to recall what we 
are all familiar with and have always been familiar 
with. These are things we have not been taught, 



156 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

although much about conscience is constantly be- 
ing instructed. We do not by any means know in- 
tuitively whether a given action is right or wrong. 
We change our convictions about right things and 
wrong things with increasing information or 
changed circumstances. But, as our store of in- 
formation was never so meager that we did not 
know that right and wrong were different things, 
so we never enlarge or modify our experience to 
such a degree that we become in the least uncertain 
about this distinction. We have always known, 
and we cannot imagine we can ever cease to know, 
that right and wrong are not the same things. 

Going along with this fact in man's mental his- 
tory is this other fact to which I have referred, that 
upon making this distinction we always feel that 
we ought to do the right and shun the wrong. Here, 
too, when properly qualified, we may make the same 
affirmation of universality. We may feel that we 
ought to do things which in fact we ought not to do, 
and which we ourselves may afterwards see we 
ought not to have done; and we may see a right and 
a wrong without any conviction following that we 
ought to do the one and shun the other. These are 
mistakes in our judgment, either that a specific 
thing is right when in fact it is wrong, or that 
the specific right and wrong do not concern us 
personally. But when the distinction is made and 
made for ourselves personally the feeling that we 
ought is sure to follow, not because we will it, nor 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 157 

because we have been so taught, but always because 
we must. 

We send missionaries to the heathen, but not to 
teach them to make a distinction between right and 
wrong, nor to impart to them the conviction that 
they ought to do the right and shun the wrong. 
There are no heathen who do not know these things. 
And we are sure about this, not simply because of 
the testimony borne by history, but because in our 
own natures, beneath all the religion and morality 
we have been taught, there is a sub-stratum which 
was present when we first awaked to consciousness 
and which has persisted through all the develop- 
ment of our faculties and the accumulation of our 
experience. And so completely has this sub-stratum 
retained its simplicity that the most cultured and 
fullest developed among us can at any moment go 
below all that we have learned or reasoned out or 
received by faith about religion and morality, and 
apply ourselves directly to these original elements. 
They are not the product of our faith, they are a 
part of our nature. They have not been revealed 
to us by Christianity, they belong to us as a part of 
humanity. 

Now where did these elements come from? I 
limit my question, for the sake of narrowing the 
discussion, to the two points I have mentioned. 
Where did man get the power to make moral dis- 
tinctions and the conviction that he ought to do the 
right and shun the wrong? It is not a theory, not 



158 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

a speculation of how it might have been; we are 
driven by the necessities of thought to say that he 
who made man made him thus. It is therefore in 
an impressive sense his religion. We might call it 
natural religion had not this term been already 
taken to signify the truths about God which man 
may learn from the natural world. We might call 
it the religion of humanity; but for the daring of 
those who have appropriated this phrase to assert 
that religion in its origin and in its operations is 
limited to men, thus taking away from religion all 
that gives it value. Let us then call it the original 
religion, since it is what we have all had and always 
had ; or the irreducible religion, since whatever we 
may lose of our original nature we cannot lose this. 
Here then we have a Divine Credential of the 
Bible written in the human heart. The Divine 
book appeals to the Divine nature in man. If the 
book should contradict this original religious na- 
ture we could not receive it, no matter how many 
miracles attested it, any more than we could assent 
to a science of mathematics which taught that a 
part was as great as the whole. It is not a matter 
of will to believe such things; it is impossible to 
believe. But if, on the other hand, the Bible should 
be found in complete accord with this original re- 
ligion it will be a proof of its divine origin of pe- 
culiar cogency, since we can no more account for 
the one than we can for the other without the cre- 
ative hand of God. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 159 

I propose therefore an examination of this origi- 
nal religion of mankind to see what it contains and 
how far its contents are in accord with or confirma- 
tory of the religion of the Bible. Neither the ob- 
ject in view nor the time will permit anything like 
a full analysis, but the few particulars to be noticed 
will suffice for all the purposes of the argument. 

Let us say then, in the first place, that in this 
original religion we may clearly discern the prin- 
ciple of justice or righteousness in operation. We 
need no revelation to disclose to us this quality and 
obligation of actions. All men discern, by virtue 
of their own nature, without aid from any source, 
the difference between right and wrong, and in the 
same way they feel the obligation to do the right 
and shun the wrong. This puts the whole author- 
ity of our individual nature on the side of right. 
I am far from saying that this authority compels 
men to do right, for no authority can do that. But 
it does compel men to know right and to acknowl- 
edge its obligation on them. Men as individuals 
and society as composed of individuals are imper- 
fect and greatly inclined to injustice. Men deceive 
one another, hate one another, kill one another. 
They do these things when they have no guide but 
conscience, and they do them when conscience is re- 
inforced by the strongest sanctions of law and pen- 
alty. But men do not act thus and call it justice. 
They do these things because their sense of justice 
has been overpowered by passion, yet all the while 



160 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

holding up justice as the standard by which they 
examine their own acts and judge the acts of oth- 
ers; all the while knowing very well what justice 
is and condemning what is opposed to it. To show 
that this is a natural state of man and not a state 
brought about by revelation or instruction in some 
religious code we need only consider what man and 
society would be with all this reversed and injustice 
instead of justice made the standard. Society 
would be impossible, for we cannot live together 
except by doing in the main or striving to do to- 
wards one another the things which are just, Man 
would have to be wholly reconstructed, for as he is 
at present no authority could make him think that 
right and wrong are the same or that he ought to 
do wrong. 

Now when a system of faith and morals is 
brought to man he is obliged to test it by this high- 
est sense, the sense of justice, his conscience. He 
may accept a system which permits him to over- 
rule this sense and gratify passion, but every such 
system must yield in authority when another comes 
which appeals always and conforms always to his 
conscience. This is the reason the Bible has uni- 
formly displaced all other systems. Its standard 
echoes the voice of the highest in us. "What doth 
the Lord require of thee but to do justly?" reaffirms 
what conscience is requiring of us every moment we 
live. The Bible nowhere makes any appeal to sel- 
fishness or lust. It never temporizes, never sur- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 161 

renders, concedes nothing to circumstances, yields 
nothing to infirmities. Straight, insistent and 
clear, its one bugle call salutes us always, "Put 
away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; 
cease to do evil, learn to do well." Like conscience 
it has authority but not absolute power. It cannot 
compel men to do right, it can only command them. 
Hence many men who have received the Bible have 
been guilty of wrongdoing and their wrongdoing 
forms a part of its record. But we are not confused 
by this record. We know what the Bible approves 
as distinct from what the Bible records. If its 
record is marred by the same inconsistencies that 
are to be found in a greater degree in the record of 
the natural conscience, yet its approval at every 
point emphasizes and repeats the approval of con- 
science. Certainly we are safe in saying that no 
other book does this. All other systems appeal to 
men in some of their other faculties, concede some- 
thing to their imperfections, give support and en- 
couragement to some rival of conscience. But the 
Bible is the express image of conscience, its inspira- 
tion, instruction and sure support. No missionary 
has to reconstruct the heathen conscience in order 
to make the Bible intelligible. He clears away 
false judgments and breaks the thraldom of pas- 
sions, and thus vindicates the authority of the 
highest faculty to be found in the heathen nature. 
And then when he brings the heathen face to face 
with the Bible deep answers unto deep; the voice 



162 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

of God in him answers to the voice of God in the 
book ; their message is one because their author is 
one; the work of the law in the heart praises and 
endorses the word of the law in the book; because 
what God has joined together man cannot put 
asunder. 

Again, we may find in this original religion the 
idea of God. It is there by implication rather than 
by positive announcement, as the idea is mostly to 
be found, but what we see compels us to admit the 
idea of God as the only adequate explanation of 
what we see. 

We proceed as follows : In all men we recognize 
the presence of the idea of right, that is to say, of a 
moral ideal, of a conduct and a character perfectly 
conceived and perfectly executed. To this ideal 
man holds up his own acts and the acts of others 
for measurement, for trial, for judgment. This 
moral ideal involves and implies a perfect moral 
Being, for otherwise there would be a default in 
nature, a conception without any object to be con- 
ceived, an ideal without any objective reality. 
Where then could this ideal come from? Men do 
not form ideas in a vacuum. Even the wildest 
flights of fancy are confined within the sphere of 
actual sensations. All the elements of which the 
most fantastic dream is woven must come from the 
experience of everyday life. Man cannot create 
that which does not really exist in thought any 
more than in fact. So if there arises in him the 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 163 

thought of a perfect moral ideal towards which his 
own conduct must continually approach nearer and 
nearer, that ideal, to have any meaning or reality 
to him, must suggest to him a perfect moral being. 

This seems to me the most satisfactory explana- 
tion of the universality of the idea of God. It could 
not come from revelation, for although "the heav- 
ens declare the glory of God," the works of God are 
not arguments to all men for the existence of God. 
But this ideal of right which presses itself upon 
every man at every step of his career ; which brings 
itself forward in every act to measure and compare 
and judge; and which must point to something out- 
side of man — this ideal preserves in every human 
breast the thought of God. 

Of course I need not dwell on the treatment of 
this ideal in the Bible. But it is significant to note 
that the Bible meets man with an entire comprehen- 
sion of his case. It does not argue about God, his 
existence is assumed. The Bible is a revelation 
of God in the sense of unfolding an imperfectly 
known Being. If man had never heard of God, if 
there had been no thought of God in him before the 
Bible was written, he could not have understood 
the revelation. He would have paused in complete 
bewilderment before the very first verse. And it 
is significant also to note that it is a moral charac- 
ter which is unfolded in the Bible. All his attri- 
butes, of course, are displayed, but it is easily seen 
that these all bear in one direction and illustrate 



164 DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 

one character; and that character is moral not only 
in a pre-eminent sense, but in an all-embracing 
sense. Everything which God is he is for a moral 
purpose. So then while the Bible does not teach 
us all we know about God it does teach us all we 
need to know; it supplements all our deficiency, 
fills up all our lack. It meets us just where con- 
sciousness and experience fail and carries us for- 
ward consistently and progressively until it shows 
us at last "the light of the knowledge of the glory 
of God in the face of Jesus Christ." 

I have not touched yet the element in Conscience 
which to many is its most striking characteristic, 
the feeling of obligation. There is no doubt what- 
ever of the universal prevalence of this feeling in 
man and it is certainly totally unlike every other 
experience. When man says "I ought" he sets him- 
self apart from every other created thing by an in- 
finite distance. Modern philosophy has striven to 
account for this feeling consistently with its con- 
tradiction of the supernatural. It has traced its 
development as a natural evolution from shame 
which some of the lower animals exhibit; or from 
prudence and fear which man exhibits in his early 
stages of development. I am not concerned with 
these theories at this time, although I think they 
may be easily shown to be without foundation. The 
question before us is that this feeling of obligation, 
whatever its origin, is here reigning in every man. 
What does it mean that man is compelled to say "I 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 165 

ought"? It means personal accountability. It 
means a personal future. It means a personal 
meeting with God. 

That this analysis is not borrowed from an ex- 
perience enlightened by revelation may be seen by 
the simple consideration that nothing short of this 
will adequately explain the feeling itself, and hence 
all who have dwelt upon it at all have been driven 
to such conclusions. And this exactly accords with 
the fact. For among all men these ideas have al- 
ways prevailed with more or less certainty of con- 
viction. As all men have felt "I ought," so have 
all men thought "I ought because I must give ac- 
count." They who seek a natural genesis for this 
feeling are prone to seek a natural explanation of 
it. And the sum of what they can say is, "We 
ought because we can only thus reach the best life, 
the highest personal welfare." Such an explana- 
tion dissipates the obligation; for I have only to 
choose not to seek the best life and the obligation 
on this theory vanishes. Whereas we know it per- 
sists through all our choosing. Whatever we 
choose, or if we refuse to choose at all, still this 
unconditional imperative summons us. Well then, 
say it has no explanation; it is simply there and 
will not be silent. This gives up the problem and 
leaves us in the childish attitude of abandoning a 
pleasing explanation because it does not satisfy, 
and refusing a satisfactory explanation because it 
does not please. But to say that God is in the 



166 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

"ought"; that he is thus pointing us to a future 
and reminding us of a meeting with him, alone 
satisfies the conditions of the problem and leaves 
us, if not satisfied, at least silent. We have nothing 
to set against this explanation. 

If God is thus summoning men through their na- 
ture what would we expect of God's Book? Does 
not the Bible answer this question in completest 
detail? "Prepare to meet thy God" is the keynote 
of all its prophecies, the explanation of all its his- 
tory, the burden of all its instruction. Its most 
solemn pageantry is arrayed about a great day of 
judgment to which all conduct is tending and for 
which all days were made. But it is not a day of 
spectacle and pomp only; of calm scrutiny, of in- 
exorable sentence rather. It may be said with cer- 
tainty that no picture in the Bible is so independent 
of author or locality, so completely universal and so 
thoroughly grasped by all minds without effort as 
its description of the Last Judgment. Here, if no- 
where else, the Bible speaks a universal thought in 
universal language. It completes much that was 
deficient, it illumines much that was dark, but it 
does not reveal a new idea ; it echoes man's thought 
and fills out man's apprehension. 

Thus we reach the close of our examination. We 
find a Bible in human conscience before the writ- 
ten word. Man with moral discrimination, with a 
moral ideal and with moral accountability shows 
the work of the law written in his heart. And the 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 167 

Bible placed beside this heart reads off the same 
great truths carried to complete exposition. It is 
the Old Testament in man and the New Testament 
in the written word. It is the reconstruction of 
the complete religion. Nature and revelation have 
met and recognized each other and no philosophy 
shall be able to separate them. Surely this is the 
finger of God. 



IX 

THE CREDENTIAL OF EXPERIENCE 



"And we have the word of prophecy made more 
sure; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as 
unto a lamp shining in a dark place, until the day 
dawn, and the day-star arise in your hearts." — 
2 Peter i, 19. 



IX 

THE CREDENTIAL OF EXPERIENCE 

Man without the conscious possession of the 
Bible is jet profoundly affected by it, and his natu- 
ral faculties respond harmoniously to the declara- 
tions it makes. This we have seen is the testimony 
of the natural man to the divine character of the 
Bible. We come now to consider what man's spir- 
itual nature will say in the presence of this book. 

A passage from one of the New Testament writers 
may be used as representative of the experience of 
all believers on this point, and is used therefore as 
the thesis of this discussion. I have quoted the 
passage from the Revised Version because commen- 
tators are not agreed upon several points in it, and 
as the Revisers have adopted one definite idea of 
the verse and have clearly expressed their idea in 
the translation, it will save time to accept it and 
will render unnecessary any further explanation. 

We all know the vast difference between arguing 
about a thing, or even proving a thing, and expe- 
riencing a thing. The matter of the divine author- 
ity of the Bible is something that may be proved, 

171 



172 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

as we believe. But admitting the full force of the 
argument that may be made in support of this view, 
it is vastly more convincing and satisfying to dem- 
onstrate by actual experience its divine authority. 
The important question we propose to examine is, 
Can the divine authority of the Scriptures be dem- 
onstrated in the living experience of the believer? 

It must be said that this author whose words we 
have quoted believes it can be. He is a man speak- 
ing of something he knows. He is a student of the 
Bible and a believer in the Bible, but he is much 
more. He knows the Bible is true because he has 
experienced its truth. Of course such a statement 
made respecting abstract truth would be mere en- 
thusiasm. But the Bible is not largely concerned 
with abstract truth. It is a repository of concrete 
realities. It is concerned chiefly with what men 
are doing, ought to do and may do ; with what God 
has done, is doing and will do ; with conditions and 
affections and consequences. Such things are bet- 
ter experienced than proved; or rather they are 
best proved by experience. And hence it appears 
to this apostle most reasonable that all men should 
test the Bible in the way he has tested it. 

Two suggestions should be made at the outset to 
meet the objections to this method of proof : First, 
it may be objected that if it is possible to come at 
once to the knowledge of the matter in question, 
all other proofs must be superfluous and our time 
need not have been occupied in considering them. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 173 

If human nature were different this remark would 
indeed be in place. But we are too suspicious to 
make actual trial of anything in matters of impor- 
tance until a reasonable assurance has been given 
us of safety or a reasonable probability of success. 
In religion our highest interests are involved and 
it would not be expected that we should abruptly 
submit ourselves to a trial of this or that theory 
until we had good grounds for so doing. The other 
proofs submitted in support of the Bible give us 
these grounds of assurance and so are of the great- 
est importance. 

Secondly, religious experience is supposed by 
many to be outside the realm of reason and sober 
judgment, and a dream of mysticism and fanatical 
rant. So that skeptics refuse to join issue with us 
at this point on the ground that we are talking 
about something which can neither be proved nor 
disproved, but is a mere matter of feeling. I am 
anxious that this objection should be dealt with in 
the spirit of frankness. I am claiming very little 
for this credential when I say that I shall ask you 
to accept nothing that is not made as tangible and 
demonstrable as any that have been brought to your 
notice, that may not be as readily tested by logical 
processes and that cannot make good its claim to be 
reasonable and practicable. I go at once much be- 
yond this and say that neither the doubter nor the 
believer can reasonably disregard this credential. 
If the doubter refuses it he betravs at once fear of 



174 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

trial by demonstration of the matter he doubts. If 
the believer disregards it he depreciates his faith 
and leaves his sincerity in question. 

What I offer you in this credential is a demon- 
stration rather than an argument. We will leave 
the lecture room and enter the laboratory. We will 
accept the offer of Jesus > "If any man will do his 
will, he shall know of the doctrine." We will imi- 
tate the courage of Elijah and cry out, "How long 
halt ye between two opinions? The God that 
answereth by fire let him be God." And by thus 
submitting ourselves and applying the test we may 
with confidence expect that our Gospel shall come 
to us not in word only, "but also in power, and in 
the Holy Ghost and in much assurance." 

When the apostle declares that "We have the 
word of prophecy made more sure/ 7 he is speaking 
for himself and the other apostles who had been 
with him on that occasion when he had seen the 
glory of the transfiguration and had heard the voice 
from heaven proclaiming Jesus to be the beloved 
Son of God. This event confirmed the word of 
prophecy. This phrase, "the word of prophecy," 
is applied to the Old Testament, the Bible as Peter 
knew it. This is properly styled the prophetic 
word, and again by Paul, "the scriptures of the 
prophets," both because so large a portion of it 
was prophetic in its character and in its author- 
ship, and because the chief burden of its prophecy, 
and that towards which all its contents converged, 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 175 

was the coming of the Christ. This word of 
prophecy had been accepted by Peter and his faith 
in it led him to follow Jesus and accept him as the 
Christ. But his attitude toward the Bible changed 
when he saw the transfiguration. Once he had be- 
lieved the predictions about the Christ would be 
fulfilled; now he saw them fulfilled. Hence the 
word was made more sure to him by a demonstra- 
tion through the senses. 

As there are no privileged classes in the kingdom 
of God we would expect what follows. The apostle 
holds out to others a promise of the same verifica- 
tion which he had enjoyed. Not the same in all re- 
spects, but the same result. No man is compelled 
to receive the Bible as a statement of fact or law or 
doctrine which he is to be prohibited from inquiring 
into. The object of the Bible is to reveal some- 
thing ; to reveal a mystery, as Paul so often puts it, 
which hath been hidden from the foundation of the 
world. Now if the Bible goes no further than to 
induce us to believe, it does not reveal. To believe 
in a mystery is to leave it still a mystery. When 
the mystery is revealed we come to knowledge. It 
is this process of changing faith into knowledge 
that the apostle is explaining in this passage. And 
it seems to me so characteristic as to deserve a place 
among the credentials of the supernatural origin of 
the Bible. 

1. The apostle speaks of "a dark place," by 
which he means the spiritual nature of man, as ap- 



176 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

pears from his further remark that the day-star is to 
arise in the heart. 

Relatively considered, it may seem an exaggera- 
tion to call the spirit of man "a dark place." Man 
is so much nobler than all other orders of creation 
that he is prone to forget his deprivations. But 
whatever may be man's intended and ultimate state, 
his present condition, whether considered mentally 
or morally, is "a dark place." There is no one 
thing which any man can claim to know perfectly. 
There is no single element of goodness which he 
possesses without flaw. We feel that the spark of 
a divine fire is in us, but it is so overlaid with our 
humanity that its light and warmth are feeble and 
intermittent. We know in part. We see through 
a glass darkly. The problems of our baser life en- 
gross us mostly, and questions of conduct, of spir- 
itual perfection, of the life beyond this weary us 
and strain our faculties, because of the unsatisfac- 
tory answers we can obtain. Sometimes we catch 
glimpses of far-off truth, but the vision too often 
departs to leave us awake on a pillow of stone. 
Our exactest sciences, our profoundest philoso- 
phies, are but guesses at the truth, hypotheses we 
call them, which we are continually striving to 
prove and continually changing. 

And what of our moral nature? Do we practice 
all the goodness we know? I speak not of those 
who are enlightened only by the religion of their 
own nature. What of us on whom the ends of the 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 177 

world have come? Is not every one ready to ac- 
knowledge that his own heart is "a dark place"? 
I will not press the doctrine of total depravity, but 
who does not know that the chief cause why it is 
so difficult to live in harmony with our conscience 
and in conformity with law is not in our circum- 
stances nor our temptations; it is in our hearts? 
Every man bears in his own nature enough moral 
evil to satisfy the description of the text and to 
justify all that has been threatened against the 
works of darkness. So that, however much light 
man has in comparison with absolute darkness, yet 
in comparison with absolute light, with what the 
constitution and tendencies of his nature show him 
to be capable of, we must describe his mental and 
moral nature as "a dark place." 

2. Now it is for this dark place that the pro- 
phetic word is designed. It shines here as a lamp. 
It is given because of our darkness and for the pur- 
pose of delivering us from darkness. I cannot stop 
here to dwell upon the benefits brought to us by the 
Bible. I shall expect you to understand me as 
claiming that much of the intellectual light, most 
of the moral light and all of the true spiritual light 
men enjoy they receive from the Scriptures. But 
this is aside from my present design. I want to 
call your attention to the limitations of this light. 
The apostle calls it a lamp. I understand this to 
suggest the idea that the Bible is not self-luminous, 
but is subject to the mechanical and human limita- 



178 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

tions of this world in giving its light. It is a lamp 
and not a sun. It shines by another's light, not 
by its own. The Bible is a book and it can do what 
any other book can do ; but of itself it can do noth- 
ing more. It speaks to us not directly but through 
the medium of language, and this has to be inter- 
preted and its meaning may be missed. It is a ma- 
terial object subject to the changes of matter and 
to the chances of history. It may be destroyed ; it 
may be hidden away; it may be unread. It is not 
magic, nor can its power be evoked by sentimental 
consideration of it as an external good in itself; it 
can do no man good until he knows its meaning. 
In other words, this lamp must be lighted before it 
can give its light. 

To these limitations arising from the character 
of the Bible must be added the limitations arising 
from man's own nature. The object of the Bible is 
to illuminate man's darkened nature. This cannot 
be done except in conformity with the principles of 
that nature. The light of the Bible does noj; illu- 
minate a man who does not see it, as I have said. 
But what is meant by seeing it in this case? The 
Bible held before a man for the first time as a closed 
book gives him some light, he knows it as a physical 
object. The Bible read in a language understood 
gives him the larger light of intellectual compre- 
hension. But is this the end of the Bible? No, for 
spiritual things are spiritually discerned, and this 
book of spiritual things must be appropriated and 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 179 

spiritually assimilated before its full object is ac- 
complished. Here theu are three distinct and pro- 
gressive steps in the illumination of the Bible, per- 
ception, comprehension and assimilation. It is a 
lamentable fact that multitudes of our race have 
not even the knowledge of the Bible as a mere physi- 
cal object. Of those who do know this much 
many are content with the smallest amount of com- 
prehension of it. While only the few attempt to go 
beyond this intellectual knowledge and receive its 
hidden meaning in their heart. 

Now it is manifest that when the Bible is to be 
examined as to its origin and character we must 
indicate what Bible it is we are speaking of. Here 
are three quite distinct Bibles. When we say that 
God made this book, which of the three do we refer 
to? Manifestly it is the thought of the Bible as 
applied to a human spirit that we mean. Hence no 
conclusion of this matter can be reached until the 
proper test has been made, the application of the 
thought of the Bible to the human spirit ; and this 
is the test of experience. This is the point insisted 
on by the apostle. We are to take heed to this 
lamp because our hearts are dark, but we are not to 
expect the darkness to continue. A definite limit 
is set to our need of the lamp ; "until the day dawn 
and the day-star arise in your hearts." The illumi- 
nation of the Bible has the power to begin an il- 
lumination in us. It not only brightens the night ; it 
brings on the day and the lamp gives place to the 



180 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

star. In this figurative language the apostle of- 
fers us the most rigidly scientific test of the Bible's 
worth. We are invited to take the Bible into the 
laboratory of our own hearts. 

3. We pass, therefore, in the next place to an 
examination of this test by experience. 

(a) We must first be cautioned that in the na- 
ture of the case not all the statements of the Bible 
are subject to this test. When the Bible declares 
that Adam was the first man, that he was created 
directly by God and that he lived nine hundred and 
thirty years^ we cannot make any test of the truth 
of these statements! by experience. But when the 
Bible declares that Adam sinned and brought upon 
all his descendants the curse of sin and death, we 
can verify the statement; at least so far as the re- 
sult is concerned, for sin and death are here. We 
have no way of determining by experience whether 
the whole book of Isaiah was the work of one 
prophet, but we can test by experience the truth of 
such a statement as "They that wait upon the Lord 
shall renew their strength,'' and its truth thus be- 
comes independent of its authorship. Peter's ex- 
perience on the mount of transfiguration did not 
reveal the place of Moses' burial, nor explain Eli- 
jah's translation. It showed him the glory of the 
power and coming of the Christ, These instances 
may serve to point out the limitations of the Cre- 
dential of Experience. It will not demonstrate au- 
thorship nor historical accuracy, nor the true the- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 181 

ory of inspiration. It is limited to things that may 
be actually experienced. And when we consider 
the aim of the Bible we shall see that this fact is 
in strict accord with its aim. The aim of the Bible 
is to teach men the truth that saves the soul. All 
such truth is matter of experience, of course; and 
therefore all saving truth may be tested by experi- 
ence. Everything else in the Bible serves as the 
vehicle to carry the great body of saving truth. 
Other truths are not unimportant, they are simply 
different from what we call saving truth. And 
they are not unverifiable, they are simply not sub- 
ject to the test of experience. We must use other 
methods and it may not be possible to reach demon- 
stration. It is fair to require the student of the 
Bible to meet it on its own ground. If the historian 
could prove that the Bible was not correct history, 
or the scientist that it was not good science, or the 
critic that it was not good literature, it would be 
nothing to the purpose. "I am come that they 
might have life and that they might have it more 
abundantly," is the announcement of every part of 
the Scriptures. The only test of the worth of the 
Bible which is final is that which puts it into human 
experience to see if it creates and nourishes and 
multiplies life there. 

( b ) It ought to be noted in this connection that 
such a credential as this brings the proof of the 
divine character of the Bible into exact conformity 
with the most approved modern scientific methods. 



182 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

Very little science is taught in these days outside of 
the laboratory. You take a book of science, say 
physics, to be taught some of the wonders of nature. 
The unscientific mind may receive many of its state- 
ments on the unsupported authority of the book. 
A natural love of the marvelous may incline you to 
believe without question that phosphorus will burn 
in water, that if a bell is rung under a glass receiver 
you cannot hear it unless air is in the receiver, that 
a feather will fall as fast as a stone in a vacuum, 
and so on. Now I say that the authority of the 
text book makes these wonders true to you. But 
when you begin work in the laboratory, when you 
make such experiments as these for yourself, there 
is no comparison as to certainty between your be- 
lief in the text book and your knowledge of the 
facts as demonstrated by experiment. This is 
what we mean by religious experience; it is the 
laboratory of the soul. How can men object to our 
faith that it is mere credence, mere love of the mar- 
velous, without scientific explanation or rational 
verification, when it is open to every man to demon- 
strate in his own case by methods that are as abso- 
lute as consciousness whether these things are so? 
If we deem it absurd for a man to write a book on 
physics or a book against physics who confesses his 
total ignorance of the experiments on which this 
science is based ; why is it not equally absurd for a 
man to refuse to believe the Bible and to labor to 
prove that the Bible is unbelievable who has never 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 183 

submitted any truth of the Bible to the test of his 
own experience? We are charged sometimes with 
taking hold of scientific matters in an unscientific 
way and we are warned to leave these things to 
trained minds. But if this charge and warning are 
good, and doubtless they are, in matters of science, 
why are they not good in matters of religion? Why 
do not men who know nothing about religion con- 
fess their unfitness to give an opinion and leave this 
to those who do know? Not to the theologians, 
they may know or they may not know ; but to those 
men of every profession, of every age and of every 
degree of intellectual ability and culture who have 
tasted and seen that the Lord is good, who have 
proved in their experience whether the doctrine is 
of God, and who say to the Bible as the men of 
Samaria said to the woman, "Now we believe, not 
because of thy saying; for we have heard him our- 
selves, and know that this is indeed the Christ, the 
Saviour of the world." 

(c) That we may not be chargeable with having 
invented a method of proof to suit an imaginary 
demand of the times it will now be proper to show 
that this Credential of Experience is no novelty. It 
is precisely what the Bible asks for itself and it has 
been in actual operation among men from the first. 
In Jeremiah xxxi, 31-34, a new covenant with the 
house of Israel is promised, not according to the 
covenant made after they were brought out of the 
land of Egypt, that is, not a written code, but, "I 



184 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

will put my law in their inward parts, and write it 
in their heart." Accordingly under this new cove- 
nant believers are constantly referred to their own 
hearts for the certification of their faith. "And be- 
cause ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit 
of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father" 
(Gal. iv., 6) . "The Spirit itself beareth witness with 
our spirit, that we are the children of God" (Rom. 
viii, 16 ) . "This is the witness of God which he hath 
testified of his Son. He that believeth on the Son 
of God hath the witness in himself" (1 John v, 9, 
10.) Jesus himself has given the warrant for this 
promise when in answer to the question, "How is it 
that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us and not unto 
the world?" he said, "If a man love me, he will 
keep my words; and my Father will love him, and 
we will come unto him, and make our abode with 
him." 

A striking illustration of this mode of proof is 
given us in the record concerning the man born 
blind whose eyes Jesus opened. The Pharisees 
brought the man before them and rigorously exam- 
ined him. When they could no longer deny the 
fact that the man had been born blind and that his 
eyes had been opened, they insisted on an explana- 
tion, which the man could not give. "Confess 
then," they said, "that it is an imposture." No, he 
would not. He could not prove that Jesus was a 
prophet and whether he was a sinner or no he knew 
not ; "one thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 185 

now I see." Let them make their theories square 
with his experience. 

Now this is a type of what goes on in the case 
of all who adopt the laboratory method and put 
the truths of the Bible to the test of experience. 
These discover that religion is not something mere- 
ly to argue about ; that the Bible is not a great bat- 
tleground where intellectual giants and critics may 
display their might. They know for themselves 
what all this superficial tumult cannot in the least 
disturb. "If a man says that there never was a 
Christ," exclaims Henry Ward Beecher, "or that he 
was only a man, I answer that I have found him of 
whom Moses and the prophets spake. I have asked 
him, 'What wilt thou?' and he has told me. I have 
put my soul and my heart, as he has commanded 
me, into his hand. Will any man now undertake 
to reason me out of the result? I know in whom I 
have trusted, and know what he has done for me. 
Is the music of my life, the inspiration of every 
faculty, the transformation of my views, the regen- 
eration of my hopes — are these nothing? Am I to 
go back eighteen hundred years with the skeptical 
philosopher to reason about Jerusalem and about 
the Lord Jesus Christ, and not reason upon my own 
actual daily positive experience?" 

And as this test of experience is the solution of 
all doubt so it must be the end of all controversy. 
The last word we can say to those who stand with- 
out demanding signs or explanations or reasons is ? 



186 DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 

"Come and see." Suppose a man in serious per- 
plexity as to whether the Bible is God's book. He 
hears reasons for, he hears reasons against. He 
weighs these arguments, but still he is not quite 
sure. Do you think he will ever reach certainty 
that way? There never was an argument made for 
anything whatsoever that another might not be 
made against it. The best that argument can give 
you is intellectual predominance. You don't study 
physics that way. There may be two contradictory 
theories in physics, but there cannot be two contra- 
dictory facts. You go to the laboratory for the 
facts and that constitutes the physics you know. 
So with this great question. Beading books and 
hearing lectures will not settle it. Examining man- 
uscripts and deciphering inscriptions will not set- 
tle it. You must go into the laboratory of your own 
heart and get the facts. "He that is of God heareth 
God's words." 

Or, suppose a man studying the prophetic declara- 
tions about the Christ and trying to discover 
whether the Christ has come in Jesus of Nazareth. 
Do you suppose he can ever know this in a sense to 
be of any vital power of conviction by calculating 
dates and reading history and examining testi- 
mony? When Peter rose to certainty in this mat- 
ter and declared, "Thou art the Christ, the Son of 
the living God," Jesus said unto him, "Flesh and 
blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father 
which is in heaven." And so Paul declares, "No 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 187 

man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy 
Ghost." 

Equally so is it of that matter of highest personal 
concern to every one of us. "Am I living in the 
loving favor of my God? Does he accept me as his 
child and assure me of salvation through faith in 
Jesus Christ?" Some persons answer this question 
by an argument. The premises are the plan of sal- 
vation as outlined in the Scriptures and their ac- 
ceptance of it. The conclusion is a hope, nothing 
more. They hope to be saved. They regard it as 
presumption to go farther. But this is a book sal- 
vation; it is argued out of a theory. And a glori- 
ous theory it is, but it is not the salvation God has 
prepared for them that love him. He has done 
something more than give us a philosophy of the 
plan of salvation. When we go into the laboratory 
we get the facts. "Hereby we know that we dwell 
in him and he in us, because he hath given us of his 
Spirit." "As many as are led by the Spirit of God, 
they are the sons of God." And so with this man 
there is an end of controversy. He may be per- 
plexed and confused about many things in the 
Bible, but the doctrine of personal salvation re- 
vealed there is established in the laboratory of his 
own consciousness and he enters into that which is 
within the veil. 

(d). I must add one more observation. This 
certification of the truth of the Bible in the human 
spirit is not an isolated fact of our experience. I 



188 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

know my father's locality ; I know his penmanship ; 
but the reason I know my father's letter is inde- 
pendent of these — I know my father. In other 
words, communications of character are verifiable 
in character. Jacob deceived two of his father's 
senses, but "the voice is the voice of Jacob." So the 
historical sense in us may be wanting and the criti- 
cal sense, but the Bible can even then speak to us. 
"Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice." 
"The words that I speak unto you they are spirit 
and they are life." I have already referred to those 
capacities, instincts and tendencies in every man 
that speak to him of God. Now as my knowledge 
of my father verifies the communication from him 
though in an unknown handwriting, so I know 
God's word by the knowledge there is of God in me. 
The historical canon is valuable because it saves 
time and labor. But we are not dependent upon it. 
Every Christian can form his own canon. No more 
certain is the attraction of the magnet for its mag- 
netized particles than is the attraction of the hu- 
man spirit for every word of God. And there is a 
supernatural reinforcement of these natural ten- 
dencies. "When he, the Spirit of truth, is come, 
he will guide you into all truth." "He shall take 
of mine and shew it unto you." "For what man 
knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man 
which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth 
no man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have re- 
ceived, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 189 

which is of God; that we might know the things 
that are freely given to us of God." 

The subject invites me, but I cannot pursue it 
further. And neither can I close without pressing 
home the great personal question that comes out of 
this discussion. Dear brother, have you this liv- 
ing, divine credential? Do you know whom you 
have believed as well as what you have believed? 
Is Christ formed within you the hope of glory? 
Must not your faith stand in the wisdom of men 
if you are content to remain in the outer court dis- 
cussing the Bible, or even proving the truth of the 
Bible? Must not your life be arid and your religion 
mere form and emptiness except as you pass 
through perception and comprehension of the Bible 
to assimilation of its blessed truth? Did Christ 
die for no further purpose than to establish a creed 
or certify a book? O no, a thousand times no. 
But to beget in us a fuller life, a deeper joy, a more 
real sense of his continual presence in the world 
and to make more sure the prophecy of his power 
and coming, "that we might know the things that 
are freely given to us of God." 

And must not the possession of this credential 
still in us the noise of debate with those who do 
not even believe these great things? They turn 
away from all argument and say they want demon- 
stration. You cannot demonstrate any spiritual 
truth to another. You can only invite him into 
the laboratory to find there for himself the demon- 



190 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

stration he seeks. Many, many skeptics have gone 
in, but never yet has one come out a skeptic. They 
go in burdened with heaviness, distressed by many 
doubts, many fears; but they return and come to 
Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their 
heads; they have obtained joy and gladness, and 
sorrow and sighing have fled forever away. Come 
then, Nathaniel, in whom is no guile ; come, Thomas, 
in whom is all critical inquiry, come and see ! Come 
and see ! 



X 

THE CREDENTIAL OF DISCIPLESHIP 



"Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on 
him, If ye continue (abide) in my word, then are 
ye my disciples indeed ; and ye shall know the truth, 
and the truth shall make you free." — John viii, 
31, 32. 



THE CREDENTIAL OF DISCIPLESHIP 

What constitutes one a disciple of Jesus Christ, 
or, What is it to be a Christian? is one of the most 
important as well as one of the most interesting 
questions we can ask. And we may be thankful 
that in some respects it is one of the easiest ques- 
tions to answer. It concerns us to consider this 
question now in order that the full effect of the 
Bible on the spiritual man may be understood. The 
answer of Jesus to this question not only furnishes 
us with the test of discipleship, but also with an- 
other test of the divine character of the Bible. His 
answer is very simple, as I think will appear if we 
dwell a moment on one of his discourses and a few 
of its attendant circumstances. 

The discourse was one in which our Lord speaks 
with unusual freedom of himself and of his work. 
What he was accustomed to speak by parable or by 
some other form of intimation, he here states in 
plain terms. It is noticeable, too, that this dis- 
course had an unusual effect upon his hearers ; for 
it is said, "As he spake these things, many believed 
on him." But its chief interest to us lies in what 

193 



194 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

follows it. It was to these new converts that Jesus 
said, "If ye abide in my word, then are ye my dis- 
ciples; and ye shall know the truth, and the truth 
shall make you free." This, therefore, is our Lord's 
own test of discipleship. And seeing what results 
are promised from discipleship in knowledge and 
freedom, this becomes in turn a test of the power of 
the Word. We begin our study of this incident, 
therefore, as one of the Credentials of the Bible. 

When Jesus set forth in plain terms his character 
and his work to the Jews that gathered about him 
in the temple, calling himself the light of the world, 
saying that he had come from the Father, was the 
same in majesty and power with the Father, and 
was indeed God manifested to the world, many be- 
lieved what he said. Thus they became, in a sense, 
his disciples. Measured by a test like this, it would 
seem possible to increase almost indefinitely the 
number of Christians to-day. Surely all those who 
believe what Jesus said are not in the church. In 
most of our communities it is the exception to find 
one who would hold Jesus to be a liar or an im- 
postor; or even to find those who positively deny 
his claim to be the Divine Lord and Saviour of men. 
Whether it is the result of associations and early 
training, or whether men are merely indifferent to 
the subject, violent infidelity is rarely heard of in 
our day, and Jesus may count multitudes besides 
church members who believe what he said. And 
it is not improbable that if a comparison were made 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 195 

it would be found that there is scarcely any differ- 
ence between the dogmatic belief of many out of 
the church and in the church. So far, then, it 
would seem that the answer to our question is sim- 
ple enough. If the effort of Jesus were to induce 
men to accept his word as true, we may say that he 
has largely succeeded already. 

But I would not have to argue with such persons 
that such belief as this does not constitute a dis- 
cipleship which can affect anything towards their 
salvation. They do not imagine so for a moment. 
But I would like to emphasize the point that such 
belief as theirs is nevertheless the real beginning 
of all discipleship. He who does not believe what 
Jesus says can never become his disciple. And if 
those who begin by believing what he says are 
never saved it will only be because they go no 
farther and not because up to that point they have 
gone wrong. 

Let us now turn to the test of discipleship which 
Jesus himself proposes. "Jesus therefore said to 
those Jews that had believed him, If ye abide in my 
word, then are ye truly my disciples." To accept 
the word of Jesus as true is the first step, but to 
abide in that word is the life of discipleship; and 
discipleship is nothing less than a life. It is not a 
mere verdict. Bring Jesus to trial before any com- 
munity and he will secure a verdict in his favor. 
But this means so little because a jury completes 
its interest in a matter with delivering its verdict. 



196 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

To abide in the word of Jesus is more than to be- 
lieve what he says. It is to believe in what he says. 
We believe what the astronomer says about the 
movements of the heavenly bodies, but we believe in 
the sunshine, we order our whole physical life by it, 
we abide in it. 

How will it affect the number of disciples if we 
apply this test of Jesus? Applying the other test 
we found it necessary to expand the number be- 
yond the limits of the Church register. But will 
anyone claim to be abiding in the word of Jesus 
who is not abiding in his Church? It would be 
most inconsistent to do so, for the Church is a part 
of his word. But must we narrow the number still 
after leaving out those not in the Church? It is a 
most solemn question we must ask ourselves. Am 
I abiding in his word? "Then are ye my disciples, 
not nominally so, not beginning to be so, but truly 
so if ye abide in my word." If I want to visit a 
man I inquire where he lives. I do not walk aim- 
lessly at large hoping to come up with him by some 
happy accident, I expect to find him at home. So 
in spiritual things we all have a home, a living, 
abiding place. It is not this or that specific truth 
that makes my home. It is the truth I live in. Our 
neighbors and business acquaintances are some- 
times better informed about our spiritual home 
than we appear to be. They know where to find us, 
and, alas ! that is not always in the streets of God's 
word. And the disciple not only lives in the word ; 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 197 

he lives on it. It is his daily food, manna in his 
desert. Yet to how many professing Christians is 
such a statement a pure fiction ! The word may be 
to them a kind of spiritual breakfast food, soon got 
ready and soon eaten. And others never get any 
of the word except the predigested tablet of a ser- 
mon they hear more or less of on Sunday morning. 
It may be they read the Bible now and then. They 
may use it as a sort of religious dictionary. But 
when they come to the work of life, its business, its 
cares, its ambitions; why, they have no more gen- 
uine intention of carrying these things on by the 
Bible than they have of consulting it for the price 
of stocks and bonds. Let us cease deluding our- 
selves with the fancy that we can be truly his dis- 
ciples, and at the same time live contented under 
the mastery of the word of self or of mammon ; or 
that we can abide in his word otherwise than by 
constant communion with it and a whole-hearted 
surrender to its principles and power. 

As he did of old, Jesus would visit his disciples. 
He would sit with them, talk with them, sup with 
them, heal their sicknesses, soothe their sorrows, 
strengthen their faith. But where will he expect 
to find them? The true home of his disciples is his 
word. If you do not meet him there it will be be- 
cause of your failure to keep the appointment he 
has made with every one of his disciples. "If a man 
love me, he will keep my word ; and my Father will 
love him, and we will come unto him, and make our 



198 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

abode with him." And while he is waiting there, 
you are wandering abroad; heartsick, perhaps; 
thinking only of an absent Christ when you think 
of him at all; with no cheer in your spiritual life, 
no strength in your faith, no reality in your pro- 
fession of discipleship, because you have shut the 
door of his word behind you and he who is there 
cannot make you hear. He is not far from every 
one of us. He is in his word always, even unto the 
end of the world. Eun quickly and open the door, 
and sitting down there, resolve not to eat, nor sleep, 
nor buy, nor sell, nor seek pleasure until you learn 
the language of Canaan, until your heart burns 
within you while he talks with you, while he opens 
to you the Scripture. 

Listen to Jesus saying, "If ye abide in me, and 
my words abide in you, ask whatsoever ye will, and 
it shall be done unto you." There is the secret of 
power. We go limping on our way, not strong 
enough to fight, not strong enough to endure, not 
able even to run the race set before us, and we won- 
der at our limitations. Why should we expect to 
have power when we treat God's word as a closed 
book, or at least as a Sunday book? All power is 
of God, and all God's power for the disciple is in 
his word. The power of the truth is there, for by 
abiding in it we come to know the truth. The 
power of faith is there, for "faith cometh by hear- 
ing and hearing by* the word of God." The power 
of prayer is there, for "if my words abide in you, 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 199 

ask what ye will and it shall be done unto you." 
The power of the Holy Spirit is there, for "He shall 
take of the things of mine and show them unto 
you." 

And hear him again, "if ye keep my command- 
ments, ye shall abide in my love." There is the 
secret of the sweetness and joy of spiritual life. 
We cheat ourselves out of these precious gifts of 
God with the idea that they are some form of mys- 
terious blessing given on special occasions and to 
special saints. It is not so, but "whoso keepeth his 
word, in him verily hath the love of God been per- 
fected." Oh, if we would only stop trying to lift 
ourselves into the rarified atmosphere of emotional 
fancies and plant our feet on the solid ground of 
God's blessed word, how much more swift and cer- 
tain would be our progress in the divine life! If 
we expect to fall in love with Jesus, or be caught 
up into ecstatic self-surrender to Jesus, we must 
first get acquainted with Jesus, and there is but 
one way to do that. Hearing sermons won't do it. 
Hearing others tell about Jesus won't do it. We 
must hear Jesus ourselves, and to hear him we 
must abide in his word. 

If we have no realization of the vitality and 
power and joy of the Scriptures, it can only be 
because we do not abide there. We visit them oc- 
casionally, but we do not live there. Preaching 
about the Bible, or worshiping the Bible as a magi- 
cal book, or buying it in costly bindings, or defying 



200 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

its enemies to take it away from us — oh, how many 
are our frenzied substitutes for the simple privi- 
lege and joy of just learning it by heart! Let me 
beseech you to try this way. If you want religion 
to be power to you and not simply creed or custom ; 
if you want Jesus to be a real, actual Friend and 
Companion to you and not simply a Christmas or 
an Easter story; if you want diseipleship to be 
righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost 
to you every day you live, try the plan of living in 
the Word. Give it the place in your leisure now 
occupied by the newspaper or the novel. Study it 
as you study your cash account. Follow it as you 
follow your chosen leader. Abide in the word, and 
a great transformation will break over your experi- 
ence and you will begin to bear such fruit as you 
have never dreamed of and cannot now even under- 
stand. 

And now I will try to tell you what this fruit is. 
Or, rather, I will let Jesus himself tell you, for he 
does not leave us with the injunction alone. He is 
pressing this word upon our attention not simply 
to test our diseipleship, but that his disciples may 
test the Word. To those who becomes disciples in- 
deed by abiding in this word another great Creden- 
tial reveals itself, the Credential of fruit-bearing 
diseipleship which proves the word divine. 

Jesus gives us these fruits chained to the con- 
ditions in a delightful sequence of cause and 
effect : ill 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 201 

"If ye abide in my word 
then shall ye truly my disciples. 
And if ye be truly my disciples 
then shall ye know the truth. 
And if ye know the truth 
then ye shall be free." 

The first promise of discipleship then is that "ye 
shall know the truth." 

I suppose you remember that the word which we 
translate "disciple" means literally a learner. 
Jesus appeared first of all as the great teacher, 
and those he gathered about him he called learn- 
ers. This relation between Jesus and men estab- 
lished by himself is most significant, and because 
it is fundamental it has the same significance now 
that it had at first. For men to refuse to learn of 
Jesus because they are proud and vain, or to neglect 
to learn because they are indifferent and absorbed 
in other things, is to forfeit the position of disciple. 
This is his reason for inviting us to come to him : 
"Learn of me." This is his reason for sending us 
out into the world, "to make disciples of all na- 
tions." And to be truly his disciples ourselves is, 
as he says, "to keep on learning the truth." 

Two things are to be pointed out here: First, 
the disciple's acquisition of truth under the instruc- 
tion of Jesus is a gradual process of learning, not 
a sudden, full-orbed revelation. This is suggested 
by the word "know." There are several words 



202 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

translated by "know," as there are several ways of 
obtaining knowledge. But the word in this place 
refers to what we might call the natural method, 
the method by which we learn as children, the long 
pupilage to signs and experiences. Jesus said to 
his disciples, "I have yet many things to say unto 
you, but ye cannot bear them now." He is the 
All-Wise Teacher, but he is compelled to adapt his 
instruction to the nature of his learners. He can 
only give us as much of the truth as we can bear. 
Again he said, "If any man willeth to do his will, 
he shall know of the teaching." God's teaching 
is the expression of his will in word, and the only 
way we can know it is by learning its expression in 
act. Jesus' school is a school of experience. It is 
the modern method of laboratory education. It is 
useless, if not hurtful, to try to teach men in ad- 
vance of their experience. This is why it is so hard 
to convince men of the reality of grace before they 
have experienced it. A man who has had his sins 
forgiven finds no difficulty in the doctrine. The 
profound mystery of it, or its seeming inconsistency 
with divine justice, gives him not the least disturb- 
ance. He has learned the doctrine in the labora- 
tory of an actual working experience. And so if a 
man attempts to anticipate experience in any stage 
of the Christian life he will become confused and 
discouraged. He must learn the truth gradually, 
step by step, as he enters into the experience, or he 
will be no better than a Christian pedant, or, alas ! 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 203 

a Christian Pharisee, talking glibly about matters 
of which he has no real understanding. 

How difficult it is, for instance, to interest a great 
many persons in this matter of abiding in the word. 
It does not appeal to them simply because it is not 
to be learned by discussion but only through ex- 
perience. As soon as you learn anything about it 
by that method you become interested in talking 
about it. If I could make a great oration about 
the Bible I might catch the attention of some who 
care nothing at all about reading the Bible. But 
the joy of learning the Bible and loving the Bible 
we will never learn by hearing it praised, or even 
by praising it ourselves. 

In the same way we miss some of the most 
precious experiences of discipleship by not being 
willing to learn. When some one talks to us about 
holiness, we say, "Oh, let us talk about something 
practical !" As if anything could become practical 
until we practice it! Jesus is all the time trying 
to teach his disciples by leading them into new ex- 
periences, but it is the same difficulty as of old, 
"they are not able to bear them." The disciples 
who stubbornly or indolently abide in the experi- 
ence of their conversion, the first and perhaps the 
only Christian experience they have ever had, never 
learn anything more. But if ye abide in my word, 
says Jesus, ye shall go on learning the truth. 

The second thing to be pointed out in this matter 
of knowing the truth is that Jesus does not promise 



204 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

us an education in universal truth. The truth he 
offers to teach us is specific, not general. There 
has been a great deal of misleading talk about the 
Bible that amounts almost to superstition. There 
was a time when men consulted the Bible by open- 
ing it at random and taking the first words their 
eye lighted on as the divine answer to whatever 
question was in their mind. And in more modern 
days we have the spectacle, not much more edifying, 
of Bible readers thinking to learn all the sciences 
and the philosophies from the Bible. I have read a 
book recently which seriously and laboriously at- 
tempts to show that the Bible is an infallible au- 
thority on such subjects as constitutional law, 
hygiene, architecture, painting, botany, zoology and 
so on. This is not a tribute to the word. This is 
not abiding in it. Rather it is a poor attempt to 
make the word abide in all our flighty fancies. It 
is said that the Caliph Omar ordered the great 
Alexandrian library to be burned because, he said, 
if those books were different from the Koran they 
were false ; and if they were in agreement with the 
Koran they were useless. But why should we in- 
dulge in this sort of fanatic superstition about the 
Bible? The truth it teaches us is of infinite im- 
portance and we can learn it nowhere else, but it is 
not the truth about everything. It is the truth as 
it is in Jesus ; truth about God and our relation to 
him; about sin and redemption and holiness and 
heaven ; truth which is taught us there just because 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 205 

we could never learn it without this divine teacher, 
but which leaves us free and responsible for the 
acquisition of all other truth as our talent and op- 
portunity may provide. For God never teaches a 
man a truth he can learn for himself. But this 
body of truth is so great and so important that it is 
sufficient to demonstrate not only the value of the 
Bible, but the divine origin of the Bible. It is 
God's book, else it never could have led us through 
so many mysteries and to so many revelations. By 
becoming disciples we have learned, or we may 
learn, truth which all other agencies could only 
give us dim foreshadowings of, which our own na- 
ture could but grope after, but which the Bible 
blazons on the sky of our experience unmistakably 
and enduring. 

The next result of discipleship is liberty. If ye 
go on learning the truth, then ye shall be free. The 
truth shall make you free. One of our great uni- 
versities has adopted these words as its motto. It 
is a noble expression of the true aim and result of 
all scholarship. It is the natural effect of truth, 
every truth, to make its possessor free in that re- 
spect. The ignorant are in bondage to their ig- 
norance. Those who hold wrong opinions are 
slaves to those opinions and to fact. But when I 
learn the truth the fact is no longer my master. 
When I learn the truth about Nature I begin to 
reign over Nature, using her materials and guiding 
her forces to accomplish my own ends. I crouch in 



206 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

the dark, not because I know, but because I do not 
know the dangers. When light comes I may see 
antagonists greater than my strength, but I crouch 
no longer; I am free from slavish fears. 

But this is not the freedom Jesus is talking 
about, and it is scarcely worth talking about until 
the greater matter of our spiritual freedom is set- 
tled. That, as Jesus explained to the Jews, is free- 
dom from the bondage of sin. No university, no 
science can set men free from sin. We call a can- 
dle a light, for it relieves our darkness and guides 
our feet, and we accept it thankfully. But who 
thinks of the candle when the great luminary rises 
upon our world and streams its splendors over 
our night? So the truths we get from universities 
and libraries are all true sparks of light which we 
gratefully follow and rejoice in. But there is only 
one Light of the world. It is a matter of interest 
to me to know how the planets move, how the ele- 
ments combine, how the soil produces fruit and 
grain and flower. I cannot but be profited and 
broadened in intelligence and freedom by learning 
the truth about other lands, their laws, their cus- 
toms, their history. I am the legitimate heir of all 
the truth of all the sciences of all the ages. But 
none of these things will interest me after a few 
years. I must know a great deal more than these 
can teach me if I would be free and at peace when 
my feet touch the brink of the great divide and I 
start upon the journey to that country whence I 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 207 

shall not return. So that I know Jesus was not 
thinking of these things when he promised freedom 
to those who kept on learning the truth. "If the 
Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." 

It is curious how the elemental in human nature 
survives all times and conditions. When Jesus 
first announced this promise the Jews resented it 
very much as men are inclined to do now. "They 
answered unto him, We are Abraham's seed, and 
have never been in bondage to any man ; how sayest 
thou, Ye shall be made free?" So university men, 
proud of their disenthrallment from ignorance in a 
few things, exclaim, "How sayest thou, Ye shall be 
made free?" So men absorbed in business, in poli- 
tics, or, alas ! in religion sometimes, resent the idea 
that they are not free until they become disciples of 
Jesus and are made free through his word. In- 
deed the fashion of the times has carried us, or 
would carry us, clear over to the opposite extreme. 
We call him a free-thinker who denies the truth of 
Jesus altogether. And we acquiesce in the notion 
that the disciple of Jesus is a slave to a set of opin- 
ions and traditions from which it only needs inde- 
pendence of spirit to set him free. Meanwhile Jesus 
keeps on patiently saying, "The Son shall make you 
free," and offers us the completest and easiest dem- 
onstration of the power of his word by an experi- 
ence. The Bible is like that throughout. It is 
true it does not argue, but that is not because it is 
arbitrary; it is because there is only one demon- 



208 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

stration of liberty, and that is not in opinion but in 
experience. The Bible announces facts and asks us 
to test them in our experience of discipleship. You 
remember one of the New Testament incidents of 
the blind man who was restored to sight. He had 
very confused ideas about Christ. He did not know 
enough to refute the assertion that Jesus was a sin- 
ner. "Whether he is a sinner, I know not; one 
thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see." 
How is any man to come into the liberty of spiritual 
truth except through the experience of that liberty? 
And so the final demonstration of the Bible remains 
for the disciple who keeps on learning the truth 
and enters into larger liberty as he learns. How 
do I know that Jesus is the Son of God? Because 
when I accepted him as such I was delivered from 
the bondage of sin and entered into the experience 
of the liberty of a son of God myself. There is the 
greatest demonstration ever offered to men and the 
simplest. From century to century the world has 
been privileged to read this demonstration written 
out large in human life. It never grows old or ob- 
solete, because it works itself out in fresh power 
every time a new soul is born into the kingdom of 
God. The Christian disciple challenges every other 
man in the world to compare the truth and worth 
of his opinions by their results. You do not believe 
that Jesus is the Son of God, or that his word is 
divine. Very well, what has your opinion done for 
you? For thousands of years men have been groan- 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 209 

ing under the bondage of sin. Who has ever de- 
livered any of them but Jesus? What word has 
ever answered their questions but this word? This 
is the unanswerable reply to all infidelity, the 
triumphant demonstration of the true word, that 
its teaching makes men free. 



XI 

THE CREDENTIAL OF DISCERNMENT 



"For the word of God is quick and powerful, and 
sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to 
the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the 
joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the 
thoughts and intents of the heart." — Hebrews 
iv, 12. 



XI 

THE CREDENTIAL OF DISCERNMENT 

We get our impressions of the character of the 
Bible from many sources. There are many exter- 
nal circumstances connected with its history in the 
world which declare that its power and wisdom are 
greater than man can claim. And there are char- 
acteristics of the Bible itself which produce results 
upon individuals and nations so wonderful that 
they seem entirely removed from the category of 
merely human actions. But in addition to these 
two classes of witnesses there is a third, partaking 
of the nature of both. It is the essential nature of 
the book itself. If the Bible had no marvelous his- 
tory connected with it, such as miracles and proph- 
ecy constitute, and if it had produced no marvelous 
results in the world, it would still remain a mar- 
velous book, because every man who is brought into 
contact with it is compelled to confess the presence 
of an irresistible majesty of character to which he 
does obeisance. 

It is reported of Jesus that on one occasion when 
he was speaking in a synagogue his hearers be- 
came so enraged that they rushed upon him and 

213 



214 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

dragged him to a precipice to cast him down; but 
in the very midst of their murderous fury they fell 
back from him and permitted him to pass unharmed 
on his way. Something like this compelling ma- 
jesty glows from the Bible, and it indicates a char- 
acter so utterly unlike any that has ever been 
claimed by other books, which is indeed an extrava- 
gant if not absurd claim for any mere book, that it 
seems reasonable to exalt this particular character- 
istic as something divine. 

The Psalmist confesses himself overwhelmed by 
the thought of God's complete knowledge. When 
he considered how impossible it was to elude the 
grasp of that hand or the notice of that eye that 
filled all space he exclaimed, "Such knowledge is 
too wonderful for me!" Cicero in one of his im- 
passioned pleas, dwelling upon the wide reach of 
the authority of the Roman Empire and the vigor 
of its administration of justice to its uttermost 
confines, exclaims, "Where shall a criminal hide 
himself? The whole empire is his prison." Some 
such thought seems to be expressed in this text. 
The word of God embraces in its comprehensive 
grasp the innermost secrets of universal man, so 
that when brought face to face with it he cries out, 
"Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither 
shall I flee from thy presence?" The Bible thus 
reveals its divine character in its power to know 
completely and to expose unsparingly the human 
heart. It does not seem a thing of paper and ink, 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 215 

a mere record of thought and emotion. It is alive. 
It is instinct with vigor. It is a sword piercing 
its way through the very joints and marrow of 
man's most secret counsels. We have called this 
characteristic the Credential of Discernment. But 
it is discernment of a very special kind. It is 
discernment of the human soul, a power possessed 
by no human faculty or device, and therefore driv- 
ing us to a superhuman power to account for it. 

But before we enter upon the consideration of 
this thought, which is the main thought of the chap- 
ter, it will perhaps be profitable for us to approach 
this main thought by considering two preliminary 
characteristics of the Bible which will furnish an 
explanation of this great attribute of discernment, 
one as revealing its foundation, and the other as de- 
scribing its method. 

1. Let us first consider what we may call the 
foundation and the explanation of this unique char- 
acteristic of the Bible. It is set forth in one word 
and that word placed first in the verse for empha- 
sis. We translate it "quick," but that word no 
longer conveys the idea. The true English equiva- 
lent of the Greek word is "alive." 

The Bible is the oldest book in the world and it is 
written in what we call the dead languages, but 
neither age nor obsolete language affects its vital- 
ity. It does not simply live, it is alive. Some idea 
of the age of the Bible may be gained by recalling 
that Moses wrote his histories a thousand years 



216 DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 

before Herodotus, called the Father of History, 
was born ; that the great tragedy of Job was writ- 
ten six hundred years before Homer began to com- 
pose his Iliad. These books are with us still, but 
only as curious monuments. Neither the history of 
Herodotus nor the poetry of Homer is a present- 
day book. And if we seek for still older literature, 
like the sacred books of the Egyptians, we find their 
leaves wrapped about mummies; or the literature 
of Babylon, perhaps still more ancient, we must 
exhume them from the debris of buried and forgot- 
ten cities. All dead! the pride and glory of the 
civilization of the past. Now they concern no liv- 
ing interest of man; they are simply curious as 
echoes of an age long lost in silence. 

On the contrary, the history of Moses is alive. 
Not only for what it tells but for what it involves, 
the brightest minds of the world are now studying 
it more intently than the most recent histories of 
our own age. It is alive with human interest. 
When, in 1799, the Bosetta stone was dug up in 
Egypt and gave in its inscriptions the key to unlock 
the mysteries of the literature of Babylon and As- 
syria, there was excitement among scholars, but 
how little did it concern the human race. And 
when, in 1881, some leaves of the "Book of the 
Dead" were unwound from the mummy of one of 
the Kings of Egypt, the world of scholarship again 
thrilled with the excitement of the discovery of 
long-lost literary treasures; thoughts and feelings 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 217 

coming up after a burial of three thousand years. 
But nothing more. Human life and interest were 
in no way affected, and there was not even any sen- 
sible contribution to the sum of human knowledge. 

But try to conceive what would have been the ef- 
fect if the world had been living up to 1881 on the 
moral and religious truth contained on the tablets 
of Babylon and in the leaves of the "Book of the 
Dead," and that then from about the mummy of 
Moses had been unwrapped the leaves of the Penta- 
teuch; or from the debris of the temple at Jerusa- 
lem there had been dug some tablets inscribed with 
the Psalms of David. That then for the first time 
the men of our generation had heard the words, 
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the 
earth ;" or thrilled to the melody of "The Lord is 
my Shepherd, I shall not want." Conceive Tischen- 
dorf, discovering in a convent on Mt. Sinai in 1859, 
instead of one of the many manuscript copies of the 
New Testament, the first and only one the men of 
the nineteenth century had ever seen or heard of ; 
and that they then read for the first time, "God so 
loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son 
that whosoever believeth on him should not perish 
but have everlasting life." 

We can lay before ourselves such suppositions as 
these, but the mind sinks under the burden of the 
conception. It is impossible to think of ourselves 
without the Bible or of recovering the Bible after 
it had been lost to the race for thousands of years. 



218 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

But we are sure of one element of this strange 
idea. If it were possible for the Bible to have a 
history in any way similar to that of the records 
recovered from Assyria and Egypt, its resurrection 
would not be that of a dead book. It would not 
come up, as Lazarus came, with grave clothes about 
it. It would not excite interest simply among 
scholars as a curious relic of antiquity. It would 
not be simply the recovery of learning and art, as 
in the Renaissance of the fifteenth century, nor the 
revival of liberty and pure religion as in the Ref- 
ormation of the sixteenth century. It would be the 
Renaissance of the human race, the Reformation of 
civilization. For this book is alive with the im- 
mortality of youth and vigor and it cannot be 
bound with the cerements of the grave, 

2. But we must notice another phase of this 
characteristic of the Bible, which we have desig- 
nated as preliminary to its great and fundamental 
characteristic of discernment and descriptive of its 
method. The Bible is described as powerful. For 
this word the Revised Version substitutes "active," 
and another version has "active power." The exact 
idea of the Greek word, however, would seem to be 
best conveyed by the English word "energizing," 
which is indeed the Greek word put into English 
letters. This is to say that the Bible is both an 
illustration and a source of energy. It is not only 
at work itself, but it imparts its energy to other 
agencies and sets them to work. Of both these 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 219 

facts there are abundant examples, but due regard 
to the time and limits of this chapter compel us to 
use only a few. But in fact the history of the most 
important eras of our race is the history of the 
Bible at work ; and the energy with which man has 
overcome difficulties and climbed the steeps of lib- 
erty and progress has been drawn from the Bible. 

The Ten Commandments are not on]y the oldest 
legislation, but no one denies that they embody the 
vital principle of all legislation, and it is absolute- 
ly unthinkable that a modern state would under- 
take to pass laws directly contravening any of these 
commandments. That great code known as Eoman 
Law, much of which is still in actual operation, 
was brought into form by Justinian, "the greatest 
legislator of all time," under the direct influence of 
Christianity, of which he was a zealous disciple. 
So that what we call the Civil Law, which came to 
us from England, and to England from Eome, came 
to Eome, through Christian Emperors and Chris- 
tian lawyers, from the Bible. 

Again, if we would see how the Bible has been 
energizing among men to produce that result we 
call civilization, we have but to note how it has 
curbed the native ferocity of human passions, first 
by introducing the idea of brotherhood among men 
and so making society possible ; then by sanctifying 
the relation of man and woman into husband and 
wife, and thus laying the foundation of the home 
and the family ; then exalting the supreme worth of 



220 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

the individual and so making slavery of every kind 
ultimately impossible; and finally ameliorating the 
strenuousness of contention and war until it has 
been relieved of most of its former horrors of naked 
butchery, and still pointing men onward to the day 
of universal peace. 

Wonderful it is, too, and beautiful to study the 
effect of the energizing of the Bible upon those 
higher products of man's thinking and effort which 
we call the Arts and Sciences. Science, that great 
modern revolution of thought which so many seem 
determined to array against the Bible, is its legiti- 
mate offspring and pride. Science found its first 
inspiration and origin in the Bible. While others 
were dumb and terror-stricken or stupid in the pres- 
ence of nature, the Bible student lifted himself 
erect as he heard the heavens telling the glory of 
God. It is the confession of famous architects that 
no beautiful architecture was known in the world 
until the temple was built on Mount Zion, and that 
Greek architecture itself was but the imitation and 
consequence of that which had been outlined in the 
Bible. Ruskin declares that "the fixed base of all 
coloring with the workmen of every great age" is 
directly stated in the Scriptures in the sacred chord 
of color as appointed for the tabernacle. Certainly 
the genius of painting has fixed its immortality and 
fame by the reproduction of Scripture scenes and 
characters. Take the inspiration of the Bible away 
from the products of Architecture, Painting and 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 221 

Music, and the world would be reduced to artistic 
beggary. As to universities and colleges, there is 
scarcely one with a century's history behind it, that 
is not the direct result of Biblical inspiration, while 
few would deny that the greatest factor in promot- 
ing education of every sort and in every age has 
been the book which sets before us the loftiest ideal 
of education, "Ye shall know the truth and the truth 
shall make you free." So it is with philanthropy. 
There was not a hospital, or asylum, or reformatory 
in the world until the energy of the New Testament 
wrought in the minds and hearts of men the faith 
that works by love. 

But we must close the catalogue. It were vain 
to tell all the mighty works in the world which 
should be ascribed to the energizing of the Bible. 
We have said nothing of its operations in the moral 
and spiritual world, its special field, because we 
wished in this place to emphasize these indirect re- 
sults of its energizing, that you might be better pre- 
pared to take up with us the real characteristic of 
the Bible and consider its energizing in the realm of 
man's spirit, to which we now turn. 

3. The great characteristic of the Bible is its 
power to know, to critically discern and examine, 
to judge the human heart. The Bible is alive, but 
not for the purpose of exciting our wonder that it 
has lived through so many centuries. It is alive 
with energy. It lives to work. And the work it 
does is not only in the sphere of external conditions, 



222 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

powerfully as it has affected government, learning 
and civilization. These are but parts of its ways. 
Indeed, we might say these are but the indirect ef- 
fects, the by-products of its energizing. It was 
given at first, and it still lives to energize most 
powerfully in man himself. 

To find a figure for this characteristic of the 
Bible the apostle calls it a sword, a two-edged 
sword, thrust into the innermost nature of man, 
dividing everything as it goes, so as to lay open the 
very thought and intents of the heart. The rhetor- 
ical impressiveness of the figure tempts me to in- 
dulge in a somewhat more particular examination 
of it, although the general meaning is already suffi- 
ciently clear. 

If we think of a sword cutting both ways, thrust 
into the body to the bone, then piercing to the joints 
and separating bone from bone, and still piercing 
and dividing until the bone is laid open and the 
marrow disclosed, we will have man's bodily struc- 
ture thoroughly revealed. Now, man has another 
life within and beneath this bodily structure, but 
it is much more elusive. It escapes the knife of the 
dissector, however skillful he may be, and refuses 
to appear at the call of the most minute analysis. 
This is the life of the feelings, the response made 
by the inner life to the world of sights and sounds 
and contacts; the life so often designated in the 
Scriptures, the soul. It reveals something of itself 
in the countenance, the action, the word, but it re- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 223 

serves the largest part unrevealed, shut in and 
guarded from every investigator. And then, still 
deeper in man, there is a life which the Bible calls 
the spirit, often totally separated from the outer 
world, always independent of it, moving and having 
its being among ideas and aspirations and beliefs. 
We never get any but shadowy expressions of this 
life, and as to discovering it, we have no fit instru- 
ments with which to make even the attempt. "For 
what man knoweth the things of a man" (the man's 
inner life) "save the spirit of man which is in 
him?" It is this inner life which is present to the 
mind of the author of the text. He is very bold. 
He imagines this life to be invested with a struc- 
ture similar to the body. And down into its very 
depths, through its joints and marrow, so to speak, 
the word of God is thrust, piercing and dividing 
and laying open its most secret contents. The pow- 
erful agent to accomplish so great a work as this is 
the scalpel of God's word. Sharper than any 
sword, more penetrating than any physical instru- 
ment, it divides and pierces our most elusive life 
and brings our darkness into the light of day. 

This, then, is the real energizing of the Bible; 
and because it has been doing this work from the 
beginning, and, without any diminution of energy, 
is still doing it, the Bible proclaims itself the word 
of God. In considering this discerning power of 
the Bible we must first understand that there is 
nothing automatic or magical about it. This sword 



224 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

does not thrust itself into man's inner life. Its 
energizing is wholly due to the Spirit of God, by 
whose direction and under whose inspiration it was 
prepared, whose instrument it has ever been. Sup- 
plementing this statement that the word of God is 
a sword, another sacred writer declares that it is 
the sword of the Spirit. This explains the mar- 
velous discernment of the Bible. It has power to 
enter our hearts and to search out and lay bare the 
hidden motives and purposes of our spirits, because 
it is wielded by the Omniscient and Omnipotent 
Spirit. "And the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, 
the deep things of God." 

These are supplemental forces, we may say. The 
Bible without the Spirit is inert, as passive and as 
mechanical as any other book. Like other history 
it might excite our interest. Like other poetry it 
might kindle our emotions or raise our aspirations. 
But it would not be alive ; it could not energize ; it 
would lack that penetrating, thrusting, compelling 
power which seizes men ere they are aware and 
drives them they know not where. It might still 
have energy — all books have more or less intellec- 
tual and moral stimulus — but it would not be a 
superhuman energy, and it would not avail to en- 
throne the Bible above all other books. "It is the 
Spirit that quickeneth ; the words that I speak unto 
you, they are spirit, and they are life." 

And, speaking reverently, we may say that the 
Spirit without the written word would not be able 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 225 

to enter the human spirit and work there its 
transforming wonders. It would be a power with- 
out an instrument. The work of the Spirit in the 
human heart is not an unexplainable mystery of 
influence, but the enforcing of ideas which give di- 
rection to our thought and set in motion our activi- 
ties. Now as the Spirit is omnipotent he has at his 
command infinite resources ; but so far as his action 
upon us is concerned he must work with ideas, and 
it is the written word which supplies these. "He 
shall not speak from himself" (meaning, he shall 
not originate what he says), "but what things so- 
ever he shall hear, these shall he speak." And again, 
"He shall teach you all things and bring to your 
remembrance all that I have said unto you." 

Now it is unquestionably true that the ideas con- 
tained in the Bible have wrought more mightily in 
human affairs than any other known to men. If 
we could take out of our intellectual and moral 
world such ideas as God, Sin, Kedemption, Eternal 
Life, we would leave that world poor beyond calcu- 
lation. At the same time it is no less true that 
these ideas do not have the same power for all men. 
They are abroad in the world, but they only move 
upon some hearts. There can be but one reason for 
this. The ideas themselves have no power to reach 
and sway us in our inner life. But when the Spirit 
uses them they are irresistible. 

It will help us to appreciate this truth, perhaps, 
to look at it a little more in detail. As we must be 



226 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

brief, however, we will take but one item of the 
long account. The Bible is a great story of re- 
demption, and the information it gives us on this 
subject is to be found nowhere else. The Bible is a 
great treasury of principles of conduct, a manual of 
life, in fact, teaching us how to live and how to pre- 
pare to live forever. Its truth on both these sub- 
jects pierces men's hearts when they are most in- 
different and absorbed with other things. It is 
written of creation that God spake and it was done. 
And he who made the world by the breath of his 
mouth works greater marvels of creation by his 
word in regenerating human nature and in trans- 
forming human lives. But these wonders of the 
operation of the Bible in the heart all wait upon 
a still greater wonder, the wonder of convicting 
men of sin. And we choose this, therefore, as the 
example for our consideration. 

Every man has within him an agent of conviction 
of sin. Even those without any knowledge of the 
Bible "show the work of the law written in their 
hearts, their conscience bearing witness therewith." 
But conscience is so vague in its deliverances and 
so pliable to the human will that it seldom leads 
men to effectual conviction. Paul declared that 
he did not know sin until the law revealed it to him. 
If it were not for the standard set up by the Bible 
men would soon confuse, if they did not obliterate, 
the distinction between right and wrong. But the 
Bible is much more than a passive standard of 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 227 

right and wrong. It is an energized standard, as- 
serting its imperious claims and executing its de- 
crees. It has convicting power. This is the only 
explanation of the strange fact that men who de- 
spise the Bible and defy it in outrageous sin so fre- 
quently end by yielding homage to it and spend 
their lives in promulgating it. It is not because 
they have been overmatched in argument, or over- 
come by compulsion, but because the word entered 
their hearts like a sword. Adulterers, drunkards, 
murderers and sinners of every degree fall down 
before the awful voice which whispers in the secret 
chambers of their soul, "Thou art the man." The 
Bible employs no detectives, sets up no courts of 
law, disdains all external assistance, and says com- 
paratively little of punishments and hell. But 
more to be dreaded and less to be resisted than all 
these is the inexorable insistence with which it 
makes every man's sin find him out and forces from 
him at last the cry, "My sin is ever before me!" 

Biography is full of well-authenticated instances 
of this power of the word, and some of them should 
find place here. Wilberforce, the great Emanci- 
pator, was won from a life of sinful gaiety in ful- 
filling a promise to read the New Testament 
through. Rochester, the most shameless debauchee 
of the seventeenth century, was converted by read- 
ing the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah. A celebrated 
professor of Goettin^en, an infidel, in danger of 
losing his sight, took up a book to see how fine a 



228 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

print he could read, and he read these words from 
the Old Testament : "And I will bring the blind by 
a way they knew not." The sword went into his 
heart and he was converted. A young soldier went 
into battle reckless and sinful, but, through some 
superstition, with a Bible in his pocket. A bullet 
pierced the book and was stopped at Ecclesiastes 
xi, 9, where the young man read, "But know that 
for all these things God will bring thee into judg- 
ment." That verse saved his life and his soul. A 
desperately wicked boy, expelled from school, en- 
listed. His sergeant, visiting the boy's former 
home, was asked by his mother to take her son a 
copy of the Bible with her request that he would 
read one verse daily. Taking the book from the 
sergeant's hand with a loud laugh he exclaimed, 
"All right, here goes for the first verse." But his 
eye fell upon the verse and the only verse he had 
ever learned, "Come unto me all ye that labor and 
are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." With a 
groan he dropped the book and cried to God for 
mercy. A colporteur in New York was driven from 
a house where he had asked permission to leave a 
Bible with the remark that the only place he could 
leave it was the barn. Accordingly he left one 
there. The farmer became so distressed afterwards 
that he went to the barn to find the Bible and was 
saved by reading it. A young man on arriving at 
college found a Bible in his trunk, placed there by 
his mother. It angered him, and in contempt he 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 229 

tore out the leaves to use for shaving paper, until 
one day his eye fell upon a verse that entered his 
soul and made him tremble at his sacrilege. A 
noted pickpocket went with some companions to a 
crowded hall to ply his trade. Not knowing what 
kind of a meeting it was he pushed up to the front 
until he heard a speaker say, "Thou shalt not steal," 
and he was so struck with his own guilt that he 
hurried out and from that time lived an honest life. 
These are but simple occurrences which you will 
make much or little of according to your way of 
looking at them. They do not prove perhaps, but 
they do illustrate the point that man's heart is open 
to God's word. Sometimes it enters suddenly, vio- 
lently forcing its way through all obstacles; and 
sometimes it enters gradually, instilling like the 
dew. But in whatever way and at whatever time, 
one entrance is enough to demonstrate its power 
and make us tremble in the presence of an energy 
we cannot account for and cannot control. Only 
this we can say, that man's inner nature is made 
for truth and not for falsehood, for God and not for 
Satan, and when God's word knocks there is some- 
thing in us to answer, and these two leap up to sa- 
lute each other. As of the Incarnate Word, so of 
the written word, it may be said, "Every one that 
is of the truth heareth my voice." 



XII 

THE CKEDENTIAL OF JESUS 



"The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of proph- 
ecy." — Revelation xix, 10. 



XII 

THE CREDENTIAL OF JESUS 

Another way of expressing the idea that the tes- 
timony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy, is found 
in the sermon preached by Peter to those assembled 
in the house of Cornelius when, reciting the events 
3>f the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, he de- 
clared, "To him give all the prophets witness," 
meaning that Jesus was not an unexpected nor a 
strange development in the kingdom of God; but 
that those who had been inspired to see the future 
had seen and testified to the coming of Jesus. But 
the text is broader in its statement, for it declares 
that to give this testimony of Jesus is the whole 
spirit of prophecy. And as all Scripture is in one 
sense or another prophetic the end and aim of the 
whole Bible is to testify of Jesus. 

I have spoken before of the Bible as revealing a 
scheme of redemption to which all other matters 
are servants or incidents. This is the view we have 
taken of prophecy. It w T as not a mere function of 
predicting future events that gave prophecy its im- 
pressive influence in Jewish history; it was the 
herald of the Christ. Although given by divers 

233 



234 DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 

portions and in divers manners it all had this one 
theme. In the sense therefore of theme and aim 
and inspiration we may call Jesus the product of 
the Bible. And what we mean by proposing the Cre- 
dential of Jesus is that the Bible is so completely 
occupied with the production of Jesus in the sense 
of delineating his character and his work that what 
Jesus is in the concrete the Bible is in outline. It 
will be reasonable then to test the character of the 
Bible by the character of Jesus. The source must 
equal the product. If there are to be found in Jesus 
elements of character not to be accounted for on 
any human hypothesis; if he manifests a power 
clearly traceable to divine origin alone ; if his wis- 
dom is more than man's and his holiness beyond 
man's dream, and his whole life a revelation of the 
supernatural, we cannot withhold our submission 
to his claim to be divine. But if Jesus is divine 
and the whole spirit of the Bible sets Jesus forth, 
the Bible must be divine also. A human book, hu- 
man in every sense, rising no higher than human 
excellence can attain, can never produce a divine 
ideal, cannot anticipate a divine portrait. That 
would be for man to make God. Men can describe 
more virtue than they practice and more holiness 
than they possess; but they cannot describe more 
than they know. The hand that portrays the fea- 
tures of Jesus before he appears must be guided 
by the same wisdom that sent him into the world. 
The object of this chapter, therefore, is to show 



DIVINE (CREDENTIALS 235 

that Jesus is in a real and reasonable sense a prod- 
uct of the Bible. This will occupy us mainly, but 
to complete and apply the argument we must no- 
tice, although in outline only, what that character 
is and how it has impressed men ; and we must then 
press the concession men make to Jesus as valid 
also for the Bible which he himself declares testifies 
of him. 

1. We observe in the first place that in claiming 
Jesus to be a product of the Bible we have in mind 
a more specific and at the same time a more compre- 
hensive claim than that which has been referred to 
before. We have already alluded to the unity of 
thought and plan amid great variety of time and 
authorship in the Scriptures. This is frequently 
observed, for one can scarcely miss so prominent a 
feature of this book. But our present claim is more 
specific than this. We mean that the spirit of 
prophecy is not a spirit of contradictory or even 
multiform aims, but that the meaning of it is sin- 
gle and is unfolded and interpreted in Jesus. If 
the Bible is regarded as the divine plan of revealing 
to us God's will, then we would say that this revela- 
tion was incomplete until Jesus is added, and he 
that has seen him has seen the Father. If we re- 
gard the purpose of the Bible to be to arouse us to 
a conception of might and wisdom altogether great- 
er than any we know and fitted to lead us to a de- 
pendence upon these for our comfort and hope, then 
we would say that while the impressive displays in 



236 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

the wonderful words and the wonderful works of 
the Bible force us to believe in an energy behind 
these developments which we may properly call di- 
vine, yet their meaning and spirit are so mysterious 
to us that when taken alone we know not whether 
to be more amazed or alarmed. But when Jesus is 
added then we learn that he that is mighty is 
mighty to save, and all power and wisdom become 
illumined with a benevolent significance and 
glory. 

In saying that our claim for the present creden- 
tial is also more comprehensive than the general 
claim for the unity of the Bible we mean that this 
is the highest credential. Not only does it come 
after the others but it comes out of the others. It 
has pleased God to set it forth last, and doubtless 
we should have been unable to appreciate it or com- 
prehend it had not the others been given as prelim- 
inaries. But while we gratefully honor the service 
these have rendered us we must yet say that once 
arrived at this credential we need no other. Jesus 
is the consummation of infinite power and wisdom. 
"We have found him of whom Moses in the law and 
the prophets did write." This then is no accident 
of history, nor a benevolent interference with the 
orderly flow of results from causes. Not a day too 
soon, not a moment too late, "in due time" Jesus 
came forth as the evolution of a love that began, 
that carried forward and that was now completing 
man's redemption. It is in this light I want you 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 237 

to look at Jesus, and this is what I mean by speak- 
ing of him as a product of the Bible. 

2. In pursuance of this idea let us consider 
Jesus as a historical product of the Bible. 

Jesus was the only begotten Son of God and he 
was also the son of man, but in his manifestation 
to us Jesus was a Jew. He was born of a Jewish 
mother, grew up in a Jewish home, increased in 
Avisdom and in stature as other Jewish boys, 
learned a Jewish trade, was surrounded by Jewish 
influences and developed under Jewish history. 
However much more than all these he was yet he 
was these. His life is no more comprehensible 
without that background than that history is with- 
out him. This is what men fail to understand when 
they complain of the fragmentariness of the history 
of the Bible. Viewed as the history of national de- 
velopment or of connected ages of the world it is 
perhaps all that they say. But as a history of the 
Christ it has a well-defined beginning and it moves 
to Jesus of Nazareth with the steady majesty of 
inevitable consequence. 

Most, if not all, of the critical difficulties con- 
nected with the Bible viewed as history will vanish 
when the true aim and idea of this history is con- 
sidered. It is a history of the Jews, but only so 
far as that people were concerned in the Christ. 
It is a history of the world, but only as the world 
is viewed as the sphere of redemptive development 
and activity. Hence there will be many breaks, 



238 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

many periods of silence in this history. Incidents 
which are insignificant from one point of view may 
be emphasized and elaborated; and actions which 
other histories represent as vital may be passed 
over entirely or only mentioned here because of the 
aim of this history. But assuming the Bible to be 
a history of the Christ as it claims to be, what 
breaks are there? what superfluous page would you 
take out? It is surely a most reasonable demand 
that the book should be judged by its professed aim. 
And it is equally just and scientific to conclude 
that when all the prophets bear witness to one per- 
son, when all the incidents help on to the unfolding 
of one event, when the whole book does most com- 
pletely describe and explain one single purpose and 
career, this then is the legitimate product of the 
book. In this sense it is contended that Jesus is 
the historical product of the Bible, since he alone 
and he completely explains and illustrates the 
whole scope and purpose of the Bible. 

3. Turn now to another phase of this book. It 
is a book of morals. To some persons it seems to 
be conflicting in its aims and standards, and ques- 
tionable in its moral instruction. Hence for two 
reasons Jesus has been severed from the moral 
teaching of the Old Testament. It was thought 
necessary in order to suppress the thought of giving 
even a qualified approval of precepts and practices 
which the judgment and conscience of mankind can- 
not now approve but which are recorded and seem 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 239 

in some cases to be approved in the Old Testament. 
And the separation of Jesus from Moses was 
thought necessary in order to vindicate Jesus as an 
original teacher of morals. 

As to the first of these difficulties, of course we 
dispose at once of much of its foundation by the 
simple statement that the Bible as a truthful record 
cannot be held accountable for the morality of those 
deeds it simply records without comment ; especially 
as it gives in most instances a record of their swift 
punishment in the natural order of events. It is a 
most violent and absurd assumption that any man 
has ever been seriously encouraged in vice by the 
examples he has found in the Bible. It is rather 
the fact that wicked men and hostile minds plead 
other men's sins, recorded in the Bible as in every 
other truthful history of man, as an excuse for their 
own, while they purposely omit and disregard the 
results of sin which the Bible never fails to show. 
But aside from these facts of record it must be ad- 
mitted that there are acts seemingly commended in 
the Old Testament which the disciple of Jesus must 
condemn. But to be troubled by this admission is 
to forget that the system of morality is as much 
subject to the law of development as anything else. 
It is unreasonable to think that God's justice and 
rectitude are involved in demonstrating the abso- 
lute perfection of the best morality of any age. 
The best morality of any age is never the best that 
God can give, but only the best the age is capable 



240 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

of. And as the capacity to understand and prac- 
tice morality has always been developing in men 
it follows that even God himself must be limited by 
this fact in revealing morality to men. We are 
bound therefore to judge the morality of the Bible 
in its development and not require of a primitive 
people the ethics of modern civilization. And judg- 
ing thus we shall find that not only was Jewish 
morality superior to any that had preceded it and 
that was contemporaneous with it, but that the ele- 
ment in it which made it superior was the element 
of redemption which found its true significance only 
in Jesus. Examined in the light of this significance 
every action commended in the Bible will be found 
just and elevating; and the light grows brighter as 
it approaches Jesus. 

As to the other difficulty, the originality of Jesus 
as a teacher is not affected by his connection with 
the teaching of the Old Testament. Those who tes- 
tified that he spake with authority and not as the 
scribes were of all men most familiar with what the 
scribes taught. Jesus himself declared that he 
came not to destroy the law and the prophets but 
to fulfill them. He condemned not Moses but those 
who attempted a false development of Moses or re- 
fused to accept any development. Jesus is unlike 
Moses but as the flower is unlike the seed. Moses 
said, "Do no murder;" Jesus said, "No, not even in 
thought." Moses said, "Do good to your neighbor." 
Jesus said, "Yes, and that means all men, for ye all 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 241 

have one Father.' 7 Jesus is more like all other 
teachers than they are like each other, because to 
him the j all give witness. He was "the bright con- 
summate flower" they were all trying to produce. 
They all built for something to follow. But when 
Jesus came the development ceased and men are 
still striving to reach the moral elevation pointed 
out in the Sermon on the Mount. 

4. It will require but a few words to set forth 
the same principle in the development of the re- 
ligion of the Bible. We do not think of Jesus as 
setting aside Mosaism and introducing a new re- 
ligion. One of the most interesting and beautiful 
phases of Bible truth is the progress of faith as it 
is traced in the concrete manifestations of God to 
the patriarchs, then formulated in the elaborate 
ritual of Moses, then spiritualized and idealized in 
the visions of the prophets and finally completely 
realized in Jesus. "There are diversities of gifts, 
but the same spirit. And there are diversities of 
administrations, but the same Lord. And there 
are diversities of operations, but it is the same God 
which worketh all in all." Take the three leading 
ideas in Christianity, the fatherhood of God, the 
restoration of man by mediation to the favor of 
God, and eternal life through faith. None of these 
ideas was announced by Jesus as a discovery, and 
yet every one of them is so developed and elaborated 
in the New Testament as to be practically new. The 
idea itself can be found in the Old Testament, es- 



242 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

pecially by those who have the light of the New 
Testament to search with, but it is rather the idea 
in germ while the doctrine of Jesus is the idea am- 
plified, "brought to light," consummated. 

The Jews recognized God as their Father and 
were expressly taught that Israel was his son, his 
first-born. But this idea of the fatherhood of God 
differed from the conception in the Gospel in two 
particulars: 1. It was narrow and exclusive. It 
limited sonship to Israel, whereas Jesus taught all 
men to say, "Our Father." 2. It was mechanical 
and arbitrary. Israel was adopted as God's son 
and the only condition was an accident of nation- 
ality. In the Gospel sonship is a real generation, 
"being born again not of corruptible seed but of in- 
corruptible." We are God's children only when 
we have God's likeness in our spirit. And so father- 
hood comes to be more than a figure of speech. It 
is a genuine relationship and Jesus himself shows 
us that relationship in actual existence. 

The idea of the restoration of man to the favor of 
God by mediation is so familiar to all Bible readers 
and the manner of its development and completion 
in the work of Jesus Christ is so well understood 
that it needs only to be mentioned here by way of 
illustrating another step in the unfolding of the re- 
ligion of the Bible. 

Eternal life is a phrase not found in the Old Tes- 
tament except in Daniel, where an obscure 
prophecy of the resurrection is found and the 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 243 

phrase "everlasting life" is used. Yet here also 
Jesus expanded and illuminated what the Jews al- 
ready knew. The Jew's conception of life was 
bounded for the most part by the earth. He at- 
tached most importance to such blessings as earthly 
existence afforded. A life after death was doubt- 
less one of the articles of his faith, although in this 
respect the Pharisees and Sadducees differed, but 
both the faith and the life which was its object were 
vague. It might be said that so far as the Old 
Testament declares it, the doctrine of retribution is 
limited in its scope to this present world. The 
righteous are to be known from the wicked by the 
prosperity which sooner or later must in this life 
attend the righteous, and the adversity which must 
finally overtake the wicked. 

Now observe how this idea fills out under the 
teaching of Jesus. First of all, fixed in as definite, 
clear outlines as the bounds of this world, he 
gives us the name and the qualities and the condi- 
tions that have fixed "eternal life" as the brightest 
reality of the human soul. But, in addition, he at- 
taches the idea of that life to this, not only in the 
sense of making this life probationary to that, but 
as making that life the onflow of this. We simply 
go on living. This opens a scope to the soul that 
reveals infinity to it. This gives to all the prob- 
lems of life a perspective which enables us to wait 
patiently for solutions we cannot now reach. This 
is the light of reason, of aspiration, of faith, of 



244 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

eternity which Jesus sheds on life. Instead of 
vaguely expecting as the Jew, or even believing in 
a future life, we realize eternal life. "He that be- 
lieveth on the Son of God hath eternal life." 

So, in regard to these leading ideas, and equally 
in regard to others which cannot be noticed here, 
we must admit that their presentation in the Old 
Testament is limited, obscure and partial. If we 
refuse to join on to these the ideas which Jesus 
brought we have an arrested development. The Old 
Testament cannot be explained without the New. 
And, on the other hand, to take the New Testament 
without the Old is to have the most inexplicable 
mystery in literature. It is a continuation from its 
beginning, and to attempt to read it alone is like 
trying to understand the Epistles of the New Testa- 
ment without having read the Gospels. Jesus binds 
both together because he is "the author and finisher 
of our faith." He presents to our view a scheme 
of religion, of which he himself is the beginning, the 
spirit of its progressive development and its glori- 
ous consummation. And thus we gain a new idea 
of the appositeness and force of that phrase the 
Fathers were so constantly repeating, "The New 
Testament is concealed in the Old; the Old Testa- 
ment is revealed in the New." 

If we have objections, then, to the Bible; if we 
hesitate to think it divine because in our critical 
examination of it we have found lapses in its his- 
tory, flaws in its ethics or inconsistencies in its re- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 245 

ligious system, it is certainly a fair and a reason- 
able demand which insists that we must make our 
objection good against the whole system and not 
simply against isolated portions of it. We have no 
right to complain of the Old Testament and leave 
out of account its connection with the New Testa- 
ment. Christians themselves are free to admit, 
"The law made nothing perfect ;" but they go on to 
claim that "the bringing in of a better hope did." 
We sometimes have quoted to us in reply to this 
demand the dictum that no chain is stronger than 
its weakest link, implying that Revelation must 
abide by the test of its weakest element. But the 
analogy is misleading, for Kevelation is not an ar- 
gument, or a chain of evidence. It is a growth, 
and we have no right to judge any growth but by its 
fruits. When such fruits are produced as the New 
Testament witnesses to, it is unfair and disingen- 
uous to say, we will praise the goodness of the fruit 
but not of the stock which produced it. Revelation 
is not a chain but a mountain range, the slow accre- 
tion of the centuries. It would be more to the pur- 
pose, therefore, if we will deal in apothegms, to say 
that every mountain is as high as its loftiest peak. 
The question for modern criticism to answer is not, 
"What think ye of Moses?" but, "What think ye of 
Christ?" If we salute the Sermon on the Mount as 
the highest reach of philosophy we must not despise 
Moses and the prophets who laid the foundations on 
which that philosophy is built. If we adore the sac- 



246 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

rifice of the cross as the most splendid expression 
love has ever made, we must also worship the God 
of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who gave that sac- 
rifice from the bosom of his glory. For there is but 
one religion. It has come to us by many portions 
and through many occasions, but its great Author is 
one, its great purpose is one and it all moves to- 
wards one great end — Jesus, the Author and Fin- 
isher of our faith. 

Let us then come frankly to this simple test. It 
is either Jesus or nothing. If Jesus fails the whole 
system of which he is the product fails also. Yes, 
and man is still without a religion; for criticism 
and faith unite in declaring that "other foundation 
can no man lay." It is either Jesus or nothing for 
the world as well as for the Bible. But if this cre- 
dential holds; if indeed we have found the Messiah 
of whom Moses and the prophets did write; if he is 
without spot or blemish or any such thing ; if Pilate 
and all kings, if Justin and all philosophers, if Cel- 
sus and all critics unite in confessing, "We find no 
fault in him," what remains but to say that a clean 
thing cannot come out of an unclean, nor a divine 
Christ from a human Bible? 

And now another part of this task remains which 
must appear presumptuous even for the highest hu- 
man genius to attempt, to undertake an analysis of 
the character of Jesus so as to set forth the specific 
testimony which that character yields to the divine 
Word which produced it. Nor is there time to 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 247 

make a simple resume of the testimony borne by 
all the prophets, by all the long past as interpreted 
by the fact, to the wonder of the Divine Person of 
the Christ. Yet something must be attempted to 
set forth this testimony although in the merest out- 
line, that in searching the Scriptures we may dis- 
cover as he said that "they are they which testify 
of me." 

Jesus of Nazareth stands forth in history as the 
greatest miracle of the ages; and if he is what he 
claims to be he cannot be accounted for without ad- 
mitting the whole theory of the divine authority of 
the Bible. 

He claims to be the Son of Man; not a son of 
man, or one of the sons of men; but specifically, 
The Son, and comprehensively, of Man. He thus 
claims perfect, ideal manhood. As such we see 
him taking on the whole nature of man and sub- 
jecting himself to all human conditions and limita- 
tions. He hungers and thirsts; he endures the 
presence of pain and feels the glow of joy; he gives 
out freely his complete sympathy for purely human 
joys and sorrows; he exhibits the human yearning 
for companionship with men and feels the sting of 
ingratitude. He had the whole assailable nature 
of man, and so was tempted in all points like as we 
are, and yet he carried throughout this wide ex- 
perience of human life a completely sinless soul. 
Not a word, not an act, not even a thought of his 
was anything less than perfect. He himself was 



248 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

conscious of his perfection and did not hesitate to 
challenge his contemporaries, who hated him with 
an intensity that would have counted no cost to de- 
grade him, "Which of you convinceth me of sin?" 
That challenge is still on record and is still un- 
answered. The disciple who abandoned his cause 
and betrayed him to his enemies hanged himself in 
remorse for having "betrayed innocent blood." The 
Sanhedrin indicted him for blasphemy after they 
had sought in vain for witnesses to prove against 
him some wrong. Pilate yielded to clamor and 
gave him up to be crucified, but not until he had 
washed his hands before the multitude and de- 
clared, "I am innocent of the blood of this just per- 
son." Nay, the very soldiers who executed him, see^ 
ing the testimony in nature to the horror of their 
deed, exclaimed, "Truly, this was the Son of God." 
And if you should continue this list and pursue the 
inquiry through all ancient and modern criticism, 
you would discover that while not a single person- 
age in profane or sacred history has escaped more 
or less condemnation from the judgment of the 
world, Jesus of Nazareth still stands uncondemned 
before the world's judgment seat, without spot or 
wrinkle, or any such thing. No man has ever 
charged him with sin, and even those who have dis- 
puted his claims and have rejected the religion he 
established have yielded to him the homage of pro- 
found reverence as the most wonderful character in 
history, because the only perfect man. 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 249 

We have next to consider that this universally 
acknowledged perfect man claimed to be the Son of 
God; and that not in the sense of being sent by 
God, or specially endowed by God; but without 
ambiguity, in the most deliberate manner of assured 
certainty, in the face of a multitude waiting to 
catch him in his words, he used this tremendous 
language, "I and my Father are one." He taught 
men as one having authority. He claimed distinct- 
ively all the attributes of God, omnipotence, omni- 
presence, holiness, eternity. When men worshiped 
him he did not reprove nor forbid them. When 
they refused to obey him he threatened them with 
as dreadful penalties as are anywhere recorded 
against wrongdoing. Conscious of his own true 
character he made plain that character to men as 
they were able to bear it, and left imperishable rec- 
ords of wisdom and might and goodness to testify 
of that character to all coming generations. 

And he claimed to be God in the flesh; the God- 
man ; veiling the perfection of his divinity in mortal 
form and inspiring his perfect humanity with his 
divine spirit. It is not enough to say that this 
claim was in no sense a response to the expectation 
of men; that there was no such conception in He- 
brew literature, that to imagine the evangelists ca- 
pable of originating such a conception is a bound- 
less absurdity. But such a conception imaged in 
any literature would only meet the derisive ridicule 
of men but for its basis of fact. It is a conception 



250 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

we cannot even now understand ; it is only because 
we see Jesus that, like Thomas, we believe and 
adore. The apostles themselves confess how very 
imperfectly they understood him. They write, not 
to describe Jesus, much less to account for him, 
but simply to describe "what Jesus both began to do 
and to teach;" and all subsequent ages have been 
pondering their words ever since to discover what 
manner of man this is. 

Here then we come to a pause. We must feel 
bound to give an answer to this question. We must 
insist that discussion cease its wanderings and set- 
tle this matter first. We hear men attempting to 
explain that the miracles of the Bible are not mira- 
cles, that its prophecies are not prophecies; now 
let them explain its Christ, for he is the spirit of 
all its prophecies and the power of all its miracles. 
The critics are insisting in these days that we shall 
pay more attention to the human element in the 
Scriptures; that we must study the Bible as litera- 
ture ; and they ask us to wait for them to dig up the 
monuments of the past to verify its history. But 
what a superficial thing is all this! Why should 
we stop to play with the shell of the Bible? Why 
not pass at once to the greater matter, the very 
heart of the Bible, "the spirit of prophecy," and 
try to know that? Now if it is impossible to dis- 
sect Jesus out of the Bible; if he is evidently the 
soul of it and not merely one of its characters or 
one of its incidents, then I ask you if it be not fair 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 251 

and reasonable to insist that the Bible be judged by 
Jesus as its greatest factor? 

Those who search the earth for hid treasure are 
guided at first by surface indications; they listen 
to the geologist to be taught why this or that rock 
need not be explored in the hope of finding gold. 
They are liable to deception and disappointment in 
the closest attention or the most diligent pursuit of 
their instructions. But there is one unanswerable 
and infallible argument to prove the presence of 
gold, and this is not given by the geologist. When 
the prospector thrusts in his pick and the loosened 
rock falls at his feet sparkling with the yellow 
gleam he knows so well, he needs no text-book more, 
and he asks no further aid of the scientist, and no 
man argues with him when he lifts the fragment 
and shouts to his comrades, "This is gold-producing 
rock, for here is the gold !" 

It is so with the Christian searching for the pearl 
of great price. Whatever may be the gratitude we 
feel for those masters in literature, in history, in 
criticism, for the help they offer us in threading the 
labyrinth of books and in testing them for truth, 
holiness and divinity, there comes a time when the 
humblest of us need no further instruction or guid- 
ance. Standing before that Presence and behold- 
ing that glory, "the glory as of the only begotten 
Son of the Father, full of grace and truth," we ques- 
tion no more, we ask leave of no critic to believe. 
This book, we cry, is divine, for here is the divinity. 



252 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

"He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." He 
who walketh in the midst of the seven golden can- 
dlesticks walks also through these lamps of revela- 
tion, and "The people that walked in darkness have 
seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of 
the shadow of death, upon them hath the light 
shined." 

To look at Jesus is to see his divinity ; and to see 
his divinity is to give the authority of that divinity 
not only to all that he said, but to all that he repre- 
sents. Let men do what they can with Moses and 
the prophets. If they speak not of Jesus it is be- 
cause there is no light in them. I¥ there is a single 
leaf of this Bible which has no testimony of Jesus 
in it, and men can find satisfaction in taking it 
away, why should I contend with them? Jesus is 
my Bible, and what Jesus says and what Jesus 
stands for, that I know is divine, miracle or no 
miracle, prophecy or no prophecy. For the Bible 
is not many books but one ; not many histories but 
one ; not many religions but one. That one is Jesus, 
and he is the spirit of prophecy, the miracle of mir- 
acles, the Lion of the tribe of Juda; the Root of 
David that hath prevailed to open the book and to 
loose the. seven seals thereof, Alpha and Omega, the 
beginning and the ending, which is and which was 
and which is to come, the Almighty. 



XIII 
THE CREDENTIAL OF JESUS' TESTIMONY 



"And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he 
expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the 
things concerning himself." — Luke xxiv, 27. 



XIII 

THE CREDENTIAL OF JESUS' TESTIMONY 

This incident of the walk to Emmaus of Jesus 
and the two disciples after the resurrection offers a 
convenient point of view from which to consider the 
testimony which Jesus bore to the Scriptures. The 
authority of Jesus has gone out so far beyond the 
limits of his professed disciples that it must have 
a very impressive effect upon all thoughtful persons 
to have brought before them without any argument 
the mere statement of what he said about the Bible 
and of how he was accustomed to regard it and use 
it. In our consideration of this subject, however, 
we ought to remember two things. First, that ac- 
cording to the view which Jesus had of himself, as 
represented by the evangelists from whom we get 
our knowledge of the facts, he was not dependent 
upon the Bible for guidance. He was himself the 
source of the truth of the Bible and the object of it. 
He had full authority to repeal or to supplement 
any or all of its statements. And as the preceding 
ages had been preliminary to the work he came 
into this world to do, he would have much to say 
that was new. Hence we would expect from him a 

255 



256 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

different sort of use of the Bible and of reference to 
it than we would expect from a teacher or a phil- 
anthropist who was merely man. And, secondly, 
we ought to remember that the Jews of his time 
were so enthusiastic, not to say fanatic, in their ap- 
preciation of the Scriptures that we would hardly 
expect to find Jesus exhorting them to believe in 
them or indulging in mere eulogy of them as a pre- 
cious possession. Much that he would doubtless 
say to a generation like ours would have been inap- 
propriate in that, and hence we may miss the an- 
swer from his own lips to much present-day criti- 
cism of the Scriptures. But, after making allow- 
ance for these two facts we can without hesitancy 
take up the record of Christ's witness to the Bible 
and expect to find all the other credentials which 
we have considered powerfully reinforced by this 
Faithful and True Witness. 

1. Christ constantly referred to the Bible as 
his own credential. "Search the Scriptures; for 
in them ye think ye have eternal life ; and they are 
they which testify of me." "For had ye believed 
Moses, ye would have believed me ; for he wrote of 
me." And in the passage which we have referred 
to, after upbraiding the two disciples for their mis- 
understanding and despondency, he began at Moses 
and explained all the references and teachings of 
Scripture concerning himself and his work. 

Now of course it would have been impossible for 
Jesus to have used the Bible in this way if he had 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 257 

not regarded it as true and as giving him a claim to 
be accepted as the Messiah. He submits this cre- 
dential in the broadest way ; not an obscure or iso- 
lated passage here and there, but "Search the Scrip- 
tures;" "beginning with Moses and all the proph- 
ets." If any of his critics, whose animosity must 
have made them more than willing, could have 
found a single prophecy he did not fulfill, or a sin- 
gle precept he did not obey ; if they could have pro- 
duced any word of this ample body of testimony 
that witnessed against him, he must have yielded 
his claims and acknowledged himself an impostor, 
so completely does he rest his case on the whole 
Bible. His acceptance of the Bible, therefore, was 
no half-hearted, qualified acceptance. He went to 
it just as he taught us to go, ready to take it all as 
the true and infallible word of God, to be judged by 
it and measured by it in all that he said and did. 

There is another meaning of profound impor- 
tance we may find in this appeal of Jesus to the 
Bible as his credential. Not long ago the Presi- 
dent of the United States went upon the platform 
to introduce to the public the author of a little book 
and to endorse and commend the book with unstint- 
ed praise. Instantly the book was seen everywhere 
and thousands of copies were sold in this and other 
countries. Similarly, when Mr. Gladstone wrote 
approvingly of one of the novels of the day it be- 
came the rage with the reading public. Towering 
infinitely above these in majesty and significance is 



258 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

the testimony of Jesus to the Bible. Jesus speaks 
of it not only as a good book, a true book, but as 
his book, the very transcript of his character. 
"Take it," he says, "and judge me by it. Or if you 
have already judged me and found no fault in me, 
then take it and judge it by me. If I am the light 
of the world, the Bible is the vehicle of that light. 
If I am the way and the truth and the life, the Bible 
is the guide by which men may find me." In the 
light of such testimony how do men dare to treat 
the Bible as though it were only literature, and 
even in the name of Jesus attempt by critical dis- 
crimination to separate it into good and bad? 

2. Christ treated the Bible as the paramount 
authority in conduct. When he was assailed by 
the temptation of Satan immediately after his bap- 
tismal inaugural into the work of God's beloved 
Son, he met all the assaults with the Bible as his 
shield and sword. "It is written" was his invinci- 
ble defence, as it proved to be the complete over- 
throw of his enemy. Thus he who might have 
triumphed in his own strength chose to rely upon 
the Bible as the supreme authority for all men in 
all situations. He began his ministry by going, as 
his custom was, "into the synagogue on the Sab- 
bath-day." "And there was delivered unto him the 
book of the prophet Isaiah. And when he had 
opened the book he found the place where it was 
written, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me." This 
and the words following were his text for hisi 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 259 

first recorded sermon. But they were also the 
explanation of his mission and the justification of 
his claim, because in him that Scripture was 
first literally fulfilled. In the more elaborate- 
ly recorded sermon, called the Sermon on the 
Mount, he used Scripture freely throughout. Lest 
they might imagine there was some conflict between 
his teaching and the Bible as they had received it, 
he was careful to say, "Think not that I am come to 
destroy the law or the prophets ; I am not come to 
destroy, but to fulfill. For verily I say unto you, 
Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall 
in no wise pass from the law till all be fulfilled." 
And then he proceeds to fulfill the old law by show- 
ing its spiritual significance. He does not abro- 
gate the law against murder, but he shows how 
hate in the heart is as wicked in God's sight, and 
thus gives the law stronger sanction and wider ap- 
plication. When the Pharisees came to him with 
the charge that his disciples were transgressing the 
traditions of the elders, he retorted upon them the 
charge that they themselves were transgressing the 
word of God by their traditions, thus insisting upon 
carrying back conduct behind the customs and tra- 
ditions of men to the Bible as the true standard. 
When he was charged with blasphemy because he 
claimed equality with the Father, thus making 
himself God, he quoted Scripture as his authority 
and silenced his critics not only by citing an au- 
thority which they could not ignore, but going 



260 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

much, beyond this dialectical device he paused in 
his citation to add an impressive characteristic to 
all Scripture, saying, "And the Scripture cannot 
be broken," words whose prophetic import have 
been realized through all succeeding ages. In that 
wonderful parable of the rich man in hell, where 
the veil of the other life is drawn aside to instruct 
us as to the bearing of conduct on eternal destiny, 
he represents Abraham replying to the appeal of 
the doomed soul that one might be sent from the 
dead to warn his brethren that they come not to 
the place of torment, "They have Moses and the 
prophets ; if they hear not these neither would they 
be persuaded though one rose from the dead." 

Let us pause now to sum up the significance of 
this witness of Jesus to the authority of the Bible. 
When he, for our sakes, met temptation as a man 
in all points like as we are yet without sin, he 
showed the sufficiency of the Bible alone to succor 
them that are tempted. Its authority is divine and 
so must encourage the weakest man and put to 
flight even the chief tempter himself. When he 
formally took up his life work among men he found 
that work described and authorized in the Bible, 
thus pointing us all to the light which is sufficient 
to show us what to do with our powers and oppor- 
tunities and how to do it. In his Sermon on the 
Mount he takes up in detail the duties of life, and 
by referring us to the same Scripture instructs us 
how to read its injunctions so as to attain the right- 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 261 

eousness that is greater than the superficial observ- 
ance of the letter of the law ; and, what is more im- 
portant, he thus assures us that we can never go so 
far in our learning and experience as to make the 
commandments obsolete. They are planted deep 
in the nature of things, and all our new philoso- 
phies, so far as they are true and vital, will be but 
the blossoming of the old stock. His defense of 
his disciples against the charge of violating the law 
of the elders is really a demand for independence 
and liberty from the laws and customs that are 
merely man-made. Yet it is not the independence 
of anarchy. It is a freedom that plants itself on 
the Bible and refuses to permit its authority to be 
modified or diluted by the fancies of men. "He is 
free whom the truth makes free." And the disciple 
of Jesus has been taught the perfect freedom of loy- 
alty to the Bible. Similar to this is his way of 
meeting the charge of blasphemy. He goes to the 
Bible to justify his claim. And ever since his time 
men have found no refuge from those who would 
deny them the right of approach to God, but in the 
same authoritative word which reveals God to us 
and teaches us our relation to him. And, finally, 
the Bible is shown to be our only hope for warning, 
instructing and saving men from the awful future 
of a wicked life. If men will not listen, if they will 
not believe, if they will not obey the Bible, then 
there is absolutely no hope for them in God's mercy 
or in Christ's intercession. 



262 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

3. Christ quoted freely and reverently from the 
Bible in his addresses to the people. 

He was in the most emphatic sense a Bible 
preacher. Of course we have only a few of his dis- 
courses recorded at all, and they are for the most 
part reported in a summary way. But even in these 
extracts references to the Old Testament abound. 
It would be a most profitable exercise for any Bible 
student to go over one of the Gospels to trace out 
the Old Testament quotations of our Lord. I can- 
not go into detail here, and indeed it is not neces- 
sary, since any good edition of the Bible will fur- 
nish a full list of these references, but I will, as an 
illustration, sum up the results of a superficial ex- 
amination of the Gospel of Matthew. In this Gos- 
pel there are about twenty-five thousand words. 
Of these about ten thousand are the direct words 
of our Lord. An ordinary reader can read aloud 
all the words our Lord spoke, as recorded by Mat- 
thew, in one hour. Yet he will find, in the course 
of this reading, at least one hundred direct quota- 
tions from the Old Testament or allusions to its 
history or precepts made by our Lord. These are 
distributed over twenty-two of the thirty-nine books 
of the Old Testament. He quotes from every one 
of the five books of Moses; from every one of the 
prophets except six of the minor; from four of the 
Historical books, and from the Psalms, Proverbs 
and Job. 

Now this sort of tribute to the Bible from Christ 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 263 

must be allowed great weight by all who will con- 
sider it. Christ was the most original teacher that 
ever lived. He never quoted a line or a phrase 
from any philosophical, historical, literary or poet- 
ical work written by men. The evangelists who 
usually narrate what took place without the least 
personal comment, depart from their usual custom 
to tell us that so original and striking was his 
teaching that "the people were astonished at his 
doctrine, for he taught them as one having author- 
ity and not as the scribes." But it was this Teacher 
who was so saturated with the Bible that scarcely 
one of his addresses were begun or finished without 
some reference to it. The citations in every case 
were made in a spirit of profound submission to 
their authority and without criticism or modifica- 
tion except to show a deeper meaning than his hear- 
ers were accustomed to give to them. Christ quoted 
the old Testament just as we quote it, "for doc- 
trine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in 
righteousness." Surely in all that has been writ- 
ten in praise of the Bible there is nothing approach- 
ing the eloquence and impressiveness of this trib- 
ute of our Lord, who showed what he thought of 
the Bible by the way he used it. 

4. Christ held up the Bible before men as the 
supreme standard of moral and religious truth. 

The Sadducees were the skeptics of his time. 
They came to him once with a flippant puzzle about 
a woman married successively to seven husbands. 



264 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

Now, said they, if your theory of a resurrection is 
true, tell us whose wife this woman will be in the 
other world? Jesus put this irreverent trifling 
aside with a solemn warning: "Ye do err, not 
knowing the Scriptures." These skeptics missed 
the great truth of a future life by their failure to 
read deep enough the Scripture which they thought 
they knew so well. And this warning is still ap- 
propriate. For with all our advancement in cul- 
ture and in general knowledge it is as true now as 
it was in the time of Christ that only they advance 
in moral and religious truth who know the Scrip- 
tures. What is called advanced thought in our 
day has labored much with the great themes that 
men have always been thinking about — God, Duty, 
the Future — and it is a lamentable confession of 
scholarship that its final word on these great 
themes is agnosticism, the philosophy of knowing 
nothing with certainty. How long have the philos- 
ophers traveled to come around to the point from 
which they set out ! St. Paul long ago defined the 
goal of those who abandon the Scriptures when he 
said, "The world by wisdom knew not God;" and 
this is to-day the supreme attainment of the culture 
that knows not the Scriptures. 

Our Lord made another statement in this connec- 
tion of a most impressive character. It was in that 
inconceivably solemn moment when he was holding 
communion with his Father just before his Pas- 
sion, Speaking of his disciples and the dangers to 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 265 

which they would be exposed after his departure 
he prayed for them to be kept through or by means 
of the truth, and then added, "Thy word is truth." 
This form of expression asserts more than that the 
Bible is true. It makes the Bible the truth itself, 
the standard by which other books are to be tested. 
But of course this assertion is to be limited to the 
legitimate sphere of the Bible. We are not to use 
the Bible to test the truth of scientific or historical 
treatises. The Bible is true even in all its details 
and incidents, but it is not the whole truth in gov- 
ernment or law or astronomy. When it has been 
fairly and reasonably interpreted it has always 
been found in agreement with all the discoveries 
and established facts of men, yet men who have be- 
lieved in it have frequently been in ignorance or in 
error with regard to many truths of science and 
philosophy. But when our Lord declares, "Thy 
word is truth," he must be understood as referring 
to the truth by which man is developed and saved as 
a rational, spiritual being; and this is moral, re- 
ligious truth. Understanding him thus there is 
no further qualification to be made. All the moral 
and religious systems of the world are tested by 
this book. Those that are contrary to it may flour- 
ish for a time, but ultimately men cast them out or 
revise them into agreement with the Bible. "Thy 
word is truth" is one of those absolute declarations 
which our Lord was accustomed to make when 
speaking of matters entirely beyond the scope of 



266 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

human endeavor. It seals the Bible to us forever 
not only as divine in its origin but final and infalli- 
ble in its character. 

5. Christ taught that the Bible was the means 
by which man was to be developed and perfected. 

In setting forth the purpose of the kingdom he 
came to establish, although he set it forth under 
the guise of a parable, using the commonplace inci- 
dent of a sower going forth to sow, he yet made it 
clear by his interpretation that its purpose was to 
spread abroad a knowledge of the Bible. "The 
seed is the word of God." This is what his dis- 
ciples went forth to sow, and this is the divine 
energy which was to produce, when it fell on good 
soil, "some thirty, some sixty, and some an hundred 
fold." Again, in his temptation, when he replied 
to the suggestion that he make bread to satisfy his 
hunger out of the stones at his feet, "Man shall not 
live by bread alone, but by every word that pro- 
ceedeth out of the mouth of God," he gave to the 
Scriptures the power to nourish the divine life in 
man, as well as set forth the duty of man to main- 
tain this life in preference to his animal existence, 
if either had to be sacrificed to the other. It would 
be useless to urge men to give up the struggle for 
bread when it interfered with the struggle for the 
life of the soul if men were not told as definitely 
the source of one as of the other. Hence this is the 
real point of his reply to the first temptation. 
Man's real life is his soul life and its real nourish- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 267 

ment is the word of God. "It is written" is a 
caveat even to the exercise of divine power when it 
would substitute "bread" for the "word of God." 
Another expression of Jesus to the same effect is 
his declaration in disputing with the Jews about 
his character and mission, "He that is of God hear- 
eth God's words." This can only mean, as the con- 
text shows, that participation of the divine nature 
is produced and proven only by an honest and obe- 
dient acceptance of God's message as set forth in 
the Bible. It is a declaration equally valid which- 
ever part of it is taken for the antecedent. "He 
that heareth God's word is of God." "Ye therefore 
hear them not because ye are not of God." This 
declaration is one of the most solemn import. Sal- 
vation is impossible for those who will not have the 
divine nature, and this nature is not obtainable ex- 
cept through the divine word. Thus it is from 
Christ himself that we have learned to exalt the 
Bible to the throne of the mercy-seat as our only 
hope for acceptance with God. 

Finally, we must revert to the intercessory 
prayer for another declaration of the use and pur- 
pose of the Bible in bringing us to perfection. It is 
that sublime prayer with which he prefaces the dec- 
laration that "Thy word is truth" : "Santify them 
through thy truth." We may not hope to enter 
fully with our explanations into this most holy 
place of Scriptural mysteries. But some of its 
meaning and power is for us if we will reverently 



268 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

attend. This is a prayer for the consecration of 
his disciples to the great work he had sent them to 
do in the world, to call men from sin and win them 
to holiness. How shall they do this without armies, 
without learning, without the influence of social or 
political position? "Consecrate them through thy 
truth." Let thy word be their weapon and they 
shall prevail against the powers and principalities 
that exalt themselves against God. Let the Bible 
be their constant theme and men shall turn away 
from the sweetest songs and the most charming 
stories mortal pen can frame to listen to the song 
of Bethlehem and the old, old story. Let them be 
heralds of the Bible Christ, preachers of the Bible 
salvation and no philosophy shall gainsay them, 
no criticism confound them. "Consecrate them 
through thy truth." But this prayer has also its 
personal reference. The disciple must not only be 
faithful to duty, he must be holy in character. And 
for this attainment there is likewise but one pre- 
scription, "Make them holy through thy truth." If 
we would be faithful to the idea of personal holi- 
ness, as Christ was faithful to it, we must open our 
Bibles to read it there in every page. We must 
pursue it as he prayed we might by learning its 
secret and tracing its lessons on the characters and 
precepts of the Bible. We must learn that it is not 
a strange gift bestowed in our dreams, not a mys- 
terious thrill of emotion, but a plain walking in the 
ways of our God, reading his will and meekly obey- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 269 

ing it in every act of our life. Make them holy by 
a constant study of thy word, a constant breathing 
in of its spirit and a constant conformity to its 
precepts. ''Sanctify them through thy truth." 

With this imperfect glance at a few of our Lord's 
references to the Bible we must close. It is a most 
cheering, inspiring study, and should bring to us 
all a deeper conviction of the value and power of 
that word upon which such a seal as this testimony 
affords has been set. Jesus occupied himself whol- 
ly while on earth with our salvation. He had with- 
in the range of his choice all the treasures of wis- 
dom and knowledge and power. But of all the in- 
struments he might have selected he chose but one, 
the Bible. To this Bible he referred as his own 
credential ; as the standard of right and wrong in 
conduct ; as the wisdom to confirm his own declara- 
tions and explain his own works; as the supreme 
standard of moral and religious truth; and as the 
great means of our spiritual growth and perfection. 

What can be more conclusive of the real worth of 
the Bible than this witness of the Christ? What 
standing should that criticism have with us which 
conflicts with this witness? Surely this must be to 
us the end of all strife, when "God willing more 
abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise the 
immutability of his counsel has confirmed his own 
word by the word of his Son." 



XIV 
THE CBEDENTIAL OF TEIUMPH 



"But the word of God is not bound." — 2 Timothy 
ii,9. 



XIV 

THE CEEDENTIAL OF TRIUMPH 

We have now come to the last credential to be 
considered — the Credential of Triumph, by which 
we mean the success of the Bible in accomplishing 
its mission notwithstanding great and constant op- 
position, wherein the Bible demonstrates its divine 
origin. 

It is true that there is a fallacious use of the ar- 
gument from success. Many falsehoods, many im- 
positions have succeeded in this world; and it 
would be inconclusive to argue that because a thing 
succeeds therefore it is right or of God. The world's 
history is filled with instances disproving such an 
argument. But this is not the argument we intend 
to use. We have already offered the credentials 
on which we rely to prove that the Bible is a divine 
book. The present credential meets the state of 
mind which follows upon a consideration of these , 
proofs. If the Bible is of God we expect that its 
history in the world will develop, amid the greatest 
opposition, the power to overcome obstacles and 
prosper in the thing whereto God sent it. This is 

273 



274 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

corroborative proof. If the other credentials re- 
mained and this could not be shown it would re- 
quire an explanation. The Almighty God may suf- 
fer man to prevail for a season and the short 
triumphs or partial successes of the wicked do not 
trouble the believer. Yet these periods must be 
brief. No real defeat is possible. The scope of 
history must reveal not only glorious victories but 
a permanent tendency towards a constantly widen- 
ing supremacy, showing that wherever and by 
whomsoever it may be attempted, "the word of God 
is not bound." 

1. That this method of proof is not a forced or 
fanciful suggestion may be seen by glancing at the 
firm persuasion of the fact which the men of God 
have always exhibited and the way they have used 
it. In the scene before us a prisoner of the Lord 
is speaking; one who, because of the Gospel, "suf- 
fers trouble as an evil doer, even unto bonds." He 
expects no release from his chains until he shall 
walk out of his dungeon to water the plains of 
Eome with his blood. He is now ready to be of- 
fered and the time of his departure is at hand. 
But, chained as he is, deserted by friends and left to 
the gloomy contemplation of worse evils yet to 
come, he refreshes himself with the confidence he 
has in the ultimate triumph of the word he has 
preached. That word, he knows, is God's; he 
neither received it of man, neither was he taught it. 
This is an axiom of knowledge. And God's word 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 275 

is not bound. Neither soldiers representing human 
power, nor wicked men representing Satanic hate, 
can put chains on the Gospel as they have chained 
its herald. This, too, is an ultimate truth, an axiom 
of faith. His fellow apostle, the intrepid Peter, 
perhaps his companion in the present tribulation, 
if we may believe the tradition, exhibits the same 
confidence. Eecalling his own weakness and in- 
stability he sees it mirrored in the changing aspect 
of all nature. "For all flesh is as grass, and all the 
glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass 
withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away." 
This is his homily on man and the best that man 
can do. But this aspect of weakness is only the 
foil to heighten the contrast of the strength and per- 
petuity of God. "But," he adds, "the word of the 
Lord endureth forever." Both these disciples had 
learned their confidence from the Master himself. 
He who was cut off out of the land of the living be- 
fore he saw the fruit of his labor and who stead- 
fastly looked upon the cross as the reward of his 
earthly ministry, saw beyond these small and tem- 
porary obstructions the full and lasting triumph of 
his word. "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but 
my words shall not pass away." 

This is the strain of all who speak to us from 
this book. They never doubted, they never hesi- 
tated, their confidence was the foundation on which 
they lived and spoke and died. They derived it not 
by inference but by their perception of the charac- 



276 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

ter of the word; it was God's, and so far as they 
were permitted to deliver it they knew they were 
giving to the world an imperishable treasure, a 
deathless triumph. 

So it has been with all who have devoted them- 
selves to the work of disseminating the sublime 
truths of this word. A noble army of martyrs 
waits here to speak to us, but we will let one speak 
for them all, John Wycliffe, "the Morning Star of 
the Keformation," the first to give Englishmen the 
Bible in their own tongue. The hatred he excited 
could not satisfy itself in unabated hostility and 
persecution while he lived; but his enemies even 
robbed his grave, burnt his body and scattered his 
ashes on the sea. In the long gloom through which 
he carried on his work this was his confidence in 
the word : "I am assured that the truth of the Gos- 
pel may indeed for a time be cast down in particu- 
lar places, and may for a while abide in silence, in 
consequence of the threats of anti-Ohrist; but ex- 
tinguished it can never be. For the Truth itself 
has said, 'Heaven and earth shall pass away, but 
my words shall not pass away.' " It is evident that 
these men saw the reason of this triumph in the 
word itself. It was not because they expected the 
sword to be drawn in its support or kings to come 
forward as its champions, or the learned and great 
to conspire in its behalf. They expected nothing 
but opposition from all these. But they knew it 
was God's word by its mighty working in their own 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 277 

lives and therefore it must prevail. This was with 
them an axiom of confidence. 

And this is still the sum of all our reasoning. 
We may not, indeed, reverse the process of argu- 
ment and say that whatever prevails must be God's 
word. But we are clearly within the limits of 
legitimate reasoning when we claim divine origin 
for a book which, to all the positive credentials of 
divine character previously noticed, to be found in 
no other book or institution in the world, adds this 
other which might be simulated in things not di- 
vine, but is yet a real characteristic of God's works, 
that it prevails. Men talk loosely of success and 
are reckless in their comparisons and conclusions. 
But it may be safely left to the critics to find any 
instance of genuine success accomplished without 
external assistance in a thing not divine. Many 
books have been popular; many have exerted wide 
influence whose character is universally admitted 
to be bad. But it is not that the Bible has been 
popular, or has exerted wide influence, that we rely 
upon. It is that popular or unpopular it has pre- 
vailed and still prevails. It is that when men 
hated it they could not destroy it. It is the per- 
sistence of this unarmed, unassisted book through 
all the history of incessant, malignant but impotent 
human fury against it that must make every re- 
flective mind pause before it and "turn aside and 
see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt." 
Taken in connection with the other facts adduced 



278 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

we have a harmonious strain ; the argument is con- 
sistent and of a piece throughout. But if the book 
is not divine this persistence is still to be accounted 
for, and we are left with no explanation of 
one of the most remarkable facts in history. It 
is thus that the success of the Bible becomes a 
genuine and an inspiring credential. As such it 
is our duty to listen to it, to weigh its testimony 
and give it a place among the facts to be accounted 
for. 

It shall be our present task, therefore, briefly to 
glance at the history of this book in the world to 
see how these expectations and promises of its 
triumphs have been realized and why the bush is 
not burnt. 

2. The first suggestion is that of passive but ef- 
fective resistance to the efforts made to confine the 
Bible. Unlike its preachers or even its writers the 
Bible successfully resists all attempts to suppress 
it. Try as they will men cannot bind the Bible in 
obscurity or silence. It cannot be bound. Its his- 
tory is a long one, far too long to be even sketched 
here. But there are some signal and critical epochs 
which may stand very well for all the rest and will 
serve to illustrate and give emphasis of an unmis- 
takable sort to this credential. 

(a) . In the Church of the old covenant to which 
the Oracles were committed may be noted the usual 
vicissitudes and opposition which have attended 
the Bible from the beginning. It was not, how- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 279 

ever, until the time of the Maccabees that a syste- 
matic and violent persecution was specifically di- 
rected against the Bible. There were many kings 
in Israel besides Ahab who "did evil in the sight of 
the Lord." There were many in Judah besides 
Manasseh whose hearts were not right as the heart 
of their father David. These turned to other gods 
and put to death the prophets of Jehovah, and did 
wickedly. But none of them made a systematic 
attempt to destroy the Scriptures. The act of Je- 
hoiakim in cutting and burning the prophecy of 
Jeremiah was an act of petulance hardly dignified 
enough to merit the name of an attack. Neither 
did the foreign foes of Israel manifest any special 
rage against the Holy Books. Although the temple 
was robbed and destroyed, the priests put to death 
or driven into captivity and religious ceremonies 
forbidden, the Bible was either unknown or de- 
spised by the enemy. But in the second century 
before Christ, that morning darkness before the 
dawn of the new day to arise upon Israel, a perse- 
cution against the Bible began the like of which 
has been seldom seen. The reverent student can- 
not evade the thought that the great enemy of all 
truth seeing the rapid approach of him who was 
the Truth, and his own consequent doom, gathered 
all his hosts for a supreme onset. In Antiochus, 
King of Syria, surnamed The Madman, a ready in- 
strument was found. Amid his many deeds of 
cruelty and blasphemy Antiochus earned the bad 



280 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

eminence of the first royal persecutor of the Bible. 
He seems to have penetrated the real secret of 
Israel's national persistence, and to have concluded 
wisely that if he could destroy the Bible Israel 
would disintegrate. The plaintive record in the 
book of Maccabees graphically describes the method 
of this persecution : "They cut in pieces, and burnt 
with fire the books of the law of God. And every 
one with whom the books of the testament of the 
Lord were found, and whosoever observed the law 
of the Lord, they put to death according to the edict 
of the king." The fate of those who resisted this 
impious undertaking left its thrill on all future 
Jewish history and it is supposed that the closing 
verses of the eleventh chapter of Hebrews are the 
record of their sufferings. 

And what was God's reply to this attack? Im- 
mediately the complete failure of the design under 
the heroic leadership of Judas Maccabeus, who led 
the faithful in a resistance that ranks with the most 
desperate and glorious of earth. But far more 
than this. While the echoes of this conflict were 
still lingering in Judea the Highest again uttered 
his voice and this time he spake by his Son. A 
new revelation, not to take the place of a revelation 
destroyed, but to confirm and illuminate a revela- 
tion preserved, to witness to the immortal vigor of 
the old and to testify anew to the enemies of truth 
that no word of God can pass away. 

(b). The second great attempt to destroy the 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 281 

Bible was made in the first years of the fourth cen- 
tury. It was in history only one of the Ten Perse- 
cutions, known as the Diocletian; but it is more 
properly classed as one of the three to be called 
Satanic, because this master spirit seems to have 
personally directed these attacks upon the Bible. 
At this period Christianity was prevailing every- 
where, and Gibbon allows that one-twentieth of the 
whole Roman empire were Christians. Diocletian 
was one of the best of the Roman Emperors, and 
was even thought at one time to be favorable to the 
new religion. But for some reason he suddenly 
conceived the most violent hatred for Christians 
and announced his purpose to restore the old relig- 
ion to supremacy. His edicts for the imprisonment 
of Christians, for outlawing them from all protec- 
tion of Roman justice, for tearing down their 
churches and even for devoting them to the most 
horrible punishments and death were not new. That 
which sent a thrill of inexperienced horror to Chris- 
tian hearts was the demand that the sacred books 
should be delivered up, under pain of instant death 
in case of refusal, to imperial officers and publicly 
burnt. It was not possible that the acutest human 
mind should thus penetrate the vital secret of 
Christianity without supernatural aid. And when 
we contemplate this scheme born in the councils of 
Satanic statesmanship and promulgated and en- 
forced by the dread power of the Roman Empire 
against an inert book in the hands of passive, un- 



282 DIVINE CKEDENTIALS 

armed men and women, we may well pause to ask 
the result. 

There was no such spectacular resistance in this 
instance as in that of the Maccabees, but neither 
was there pronounced success on the part of the 
Emperor. Some delivered up the books, but multi- 
tudes refused, even unto a horrible death. Gale- 
rius, the miserable man who had instigated the 
plot, publicly recalled the edict after his body be- 
gan to be eaten by the horrible death which all men 
have recognized as God's avenging finger, which had 
smitten Herod the Great and was once again to 
smite Philip of Spain. Multitudes of the perse- 
cuted and tortured lived to hear and answer a cry 
for mercy and prayer from the despairing soul of 
him who thought he could curse God and live. They 
lived to see their precious books come once more to 
the free light of study and devotion, and to fix an 
ineffaceable stigma upon those who had basely 
bought life by delivering God's word to public 
shame in the name they gave them, "traditores ;" a 
name destined to pillory in irreparable infamy all 
those who sell their trust, a name which no man 
can bear and desire to live — "traitor." 

But again there was a far wider success. For 
God ever lifts his cause to higher levels in restrain- 
ing the wrath of man against it. The Diocletian 
was the most severe of all the organized persecu- 
tions of the State against Christians, but it w r as 
also the last. The next Emperor was Constantine, 



DIVINE CEEDENTIALS 283 

who proclaimed Christianity as the religion of the 
Empire. "Out of the eater came forth meat and 
out of the strong came forth sweetness." 

(c). And where now shall we look for the third 
organized attack upon the Scriptures? Strange 
perversity of human nature, it was not among its 
avowed enemies, but among its professed friends 
and custodians, that the next scheme to suppress 
the word of God originated! In the twelfth and 
thirteenth centuries, when the saints pursued their 
calling in the seclusion of their cells and left men 
to find the bread of life as they could, there arose 
simultaneously in various countries a people known 
under various designations given sometimes in ridi- 
cule and sometimes in reverence, who were inspired 
with a longing that braved poverty, ridicule and 
persecution to stay the famine that ravaged the 
spiritual life of the world and to give the people the 
Scriptures. Great success welcomed them every- 
where. Churches were deserted. Priestly revenues 
were cut off and the hierarchy saw with alarm that 
their hold on the multitude was loosening. The 
thought inspired Dominic, a monk, to begin a coun- 
ter activity. Probably his first thought was a be- 
nevolent one, but the army of preaching monks he 
organized and sent forth soon became an army of 
persecutors. Their aim was not to distribute the 
Bible, but to warn men not to read it and to com- 
mand them to listen to the Church ; to hunt out the 
Bible as a pestilence, to burn it and those who per- 



284 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

sisted in reading it, and all under the pretence of 
ridding the Church of heresy. The scheme was ap- 
proved by the Pope, grew to constantly widening 
proportions and influence, was finally recognized by 
a General Council and baptized with the name 
which still wakes horror in Christendom, as the 
most dreadful, the most pitiless, the most useless, 
the most blasphemous mockery of the Spirit of 
Christ in the name of Christ the world is destined to 
see. The Inquisition! Who can ever tell its story? It 
is written in blood and groans and ashes. At last 
Satan seemed to triumph. The saints of God hushed 
even the voice of prayer lest a sigh should betray 
their hiding place. The Bible, denounced, ban- 
ished, was at last as a fitting climax chained! 
Fancy a man brought up in a Christian home, edu- 
cated in a Christian university and actually trained 
in the learning of the times for the Christian min- 
istry, who never saw a copy of the Bible, until he 
accidentally found a copy chained to a reading desk 
in a monastery! This man, or rather one of the 
multitudes of such men, was Martin Luther. And 
Martin Luther means the Reformation. And the 
Reformation means God's answer to this last de- 
fiance of the hosts of darkness. Yes, we may say 
the last defiance; for we may well believe that 
however active and malignant future attacks may 
be the attempt will not again be made to suppress 
the Bible. We have come into a heritage of civili- 
zation, of education and of appreciation of civil 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 285 

and religious liberty that will tolerate no politics, 
no religious nor priestly craft, no miscalled liberal- 
ism that proposes in any place or in any way to 
hinder, to restrict, to depreciate, to chain the word 
of God. We have received a precious and sacred 
legacy from those who freely gave their lives that 
they might give to us a free and open Bible. And 
free and open, by God's grace and by Christian 
vigilance and courage, it shall remain. It shall be 
free in our churches from man-imposed interpreta- 
tion; it shall be free in our homes from priestly 
interdict and in our closets from priestly confer- 
ence; yes, and it shall be free in our schools, since 
the promise is unto us and our children that they, 
too, may learn and rejoice that "the word of God is 
not bound." 

(d). Before closing this list it seems necessary 
to say something of modern Biblical criticism. 
Whether this deserves to be classed among the or- 
ganized attacks on the Bible is an open question. 
Many who sympathize with its purpose strenuously 
deny that its intention or effect is in any degree 
hostile. But to many others it seems that this 
movement differs from such others as have been 
mentioned only in method. Those were bold, di- 
rect efforts to destroy the Bible ; this is an effort to 
prove that there is no Bible to destroy, that what 
we have regarded as sacred is in fact unworthy of 
such regard and ought to be approached in the 
same spirit of fearless criticism with which we 



286 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

study any other book. Instead of taking away the 
Bible from us by force this appears like an effort to 
induce us to throw it away. 

Modern Biblical criticism appears in two phases. 
There are questions that affect the contents of the 
Bible from the standpoint of history and science; 
and there are questions of purely literary form. 
But in both the foundation is tbe same. It is a 
criticism that proceeds largely if not altogether 
from subjective considerations. The reasons of- 
fered exist in the critic's mind rather than in ob- 
jective reality, and the final argument given in 
many cases is that the critic feels that this is true 
and that is false, or that this is authentic and that 
is not. 

But, as it will be claimed that we are not compe- 
tent to judge even of the methods of this new learn- 
ing, but must submit to the scholars both for in- 
formation and conclusions, we will concern our- 
selves with the result of it all up to this time. And 
we cannot be wrong in saying that the movement 
has given a remarkable impetus to the study of the 
Bible on all sides ; that many radical opinions for- 
merly held to be irrefutable have been given up by 
the critics ; that research has confirmed Bible state- 
ments which were formerly unsupported ; and that 
the weight of critical authority is more and more 
inclined to support the literary and historical in- 
tegrity of the Bible. So that we may venture to 
sav that out of this last conflict the Bible is once 



DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 287 

more emerging triumphant; that we may add to 
the symbol of Protestantism, "nothing but the 
Bible/' the symbol of the new criticism, "the whole 
Bible ;" and that we may look on with confidence 
while the storm of criticism rages, assured that 
nothing can come of it but "the removing of those 
things that are shaken, as of things that are made, 
that those things wmich cannot be shaken may re- 
main. " 

3. But far more than the idea of the passive re- 
sistance of the word of God to all attempts to sup- 
press it is suggested, when it is said that the word 
is not bound. This is a mode of softening his ex- 
pressions and suggesting more than his words actu- 
ally say, frequently found in Paul's writings. As 
when he tells King Agrippa, "I was not disobedient 
to the heavenly vision," meaning that he instantly 
and cheerfully obeyed. Or, when he tells the Ko- 
mans, "I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ," 
meaning that it was his glory and crown of rejoic- 
ing. So here, in saying "the word of God is not 
bound," he means that it has aggressive power; 
that it moves on to its consummating purpose with 
ever increasing speed and irresistible might. 

Let us therefore devote the remainder of this 
chapter to a consideration of the aggressiveness of 
the Bible. 

(a). And first it is to be remarked that in the 
mere physical sense the Bible is abroad in the world 
to-day to an extent unknown to any other book, 



288 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

and almost beyond the comprehension of human 
calculation. At the beginning of the nineteenth 
century the Bible existed in some fifty translations, 
and it has been computed that there were less than 
five million copies of the Bible in all the world. 
The first Bible to be printed in this country was at 
the close of our Revolutionary War. Whole States 
on the continent of Europe had no circulation of 
the Scriptures among the people. The pagan world 
was totally without the Bible and no effort was 
made to give it to them. If an attempt had been 
made at the beginning of the nineteenth century to 
forecast by mathematics the number of copies of 
the Bible which would be in existence at the close 
of the century, the forecast, based on the results of 
the seventeen hundred years since the Bible was 
finished, would have been 5,300,000 copies, the aver- 
age annual increase being 3,000 copies. If some 
genius could have foreseen the marvelous rate of in- 
crease in population of this Western world and had 
dared to predict that the Bible would multiply as 
rapidly as the population of the United States, he 
would have prophesied that the close of the nine- 
teenth century would see 55,000,000 copies of the 
Bible in existence. But consider the actual fact. 
The American Bible Society was organized in 1816 
and has issued 80,000,000 copies of the Scriptures. 
The British and Foreign Bible Society was organ- 
ized in 1804 and has issued 160,000,000 copies. 
There are seventy-three societies organized for this 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 289 

purpose and their combined issue of the Scriptures 
in whole or in part is not less than 280,000,000 
copies for the century. In addition to these so- 
cieties whose mission it is to give the Bible to men 
without money and without price if they will not 
have it otherwise, there are many publishing houses 
which carry on this trade for profit; for it is true 
that no book sells like the Bible. There are single 
publishing houses which print and sell more copies 
of the Bible than the American Bible Society, whose 
issue is nearly 1,500,000 copies a year. So that it 
is safe to estimate that since the beginning of the 
nineteenth century 600,000,000 copies of the Bible 
have been published. 

What a stupendous physical fact! Ten copies 
of the Bible printed and bound for every minute of 
every day of every year of the century ! It is esti- 
mated that seventy persons are born and sixty- 
seven die every minute, leaving a surplus to life of 
three to the minute. The British and Foreign Bible 
Society alone publishes more than eight copies of 
the Bible every minute. The Bible is now printed 
in 350 languages. It circulates in the language of 
the people in almost every country on the globe, so 
that the miracle of Pentecost has become the fact 
of history, and we hear, every man in our own 
tongue wherein we were born, the wonderful works 
of God. 

If all the printing presses should now be stopped 
yet enough copies of the Bible have already been 



290 DIVINE CBEDENTIALS 

printed in one century alone to give a copy to 
every family on this earth, Christian and pagan, 
civilized and savage, bond and free. Nor is this 
marvelous circulation the result of human greed; 
it is almost wholly benevolent. In the thirteenth 
century a copy of the Bible cost as much as the 
wages of a laboring man amounted to in fifteen 
years. Now a complete English Bible can be 
bought for twenty-five cents and a New Testament 
for five cents. The Bible is thus the cheapest book 
in the world, made so because those who read it 
give their money freely that others may read it. 
This is what we mean by the physical triumph of 
the Bible. Like a resistless tide it rises and moves 
majestically on. The crowd of critics stand on 
the shore and attempt to show by argument that it 
cannot advance, or that it ought not to advance, or 
even command, like Canute, that it shall not ad- 
vance. And for answer the floods lift up them- 
selves and sweep straight on to overwhelm the puny 
opposition. 

Shall we call this a book? Is this a thing of 
mere paper and ink? Nay, but a living creature 
whose spirit is in all the wheels that run to and 
fro in the earth. 

(ft). And still we must say, vast and splendid 
as this physical triumph is, that it would be ignoble 
if this were all, for it is but physical. It would be 
as if God's might were divorced from his wisdom 
and love. But if the mind has staggered in the ef- 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 291 

fort to comprehend this physical triumph, how 
shall we hope to express in any adequate way the 
intellectual, the social, the moral and spiritual 
triumphs of the word of God? To enter upon this 
is to open the history of the world, to read the rec- 
ords of civilization. 

It would profit but little to speculate upon what 
man would be without the Bible, nor is it neces- 
sary. There he is, the Bushman in Australia; the 
Hottentot in Africa; the wild, licentious, famish- 
ing hordes of Asia and India. In these who still 
refuse the light and joy the Bible would bring, God 
is keeping before us an object lesson of what man 
actually is without the Bible. 

And equally impressive is the lesson taught by 
the condition of those peoples where the Bible actu- 
ally is. Here it is unnecessary to deal in statistics, 
for the facts are so easily accessible that I should 
only weary you in repeating them. The sober 
statement of conclusions is enough. We are war- 
ranted in saying that if anywhere on our earth to- 
day men have arisen from superstition to stand 
clear-eyed before effulgent truth ; if there is among 
men a society cemented by purity, animated by lib- 
erty and guarded by law; if men have formulated 
civil codes strong enough to perpetuate peace and 
give to duty authoritative voice by engraving them 
deep in the conscience; if men have anywhere es- 
caped the limits of matter and the thraldom of 
lusts and fears by adding to this life the inspira- 



292 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

tion of a life to come, it is because the Son of Man 
spake by authority when he said, "Ye shall know 
the truth and the truth shall make you free." For 
wherever and to whatever extent man has known 
the Bible, there and thus has man been free. 

As the helper of our joy and the minister to our 
supreme good the Bible speaks evermore in the 
voice of the apostle, "I have no greater joy than to 
hear that my children walk in truth." This its 
joy is fulfilled. Somewhere beyond the sun, circled 
with light that no man can approach unto, I imag- 
ine the spirit of the Bible is enthroned. From the 
depths of its glory it looks forth upon Christendom. 
It sees its children walking on the highways of holi- 
ness, radiant, triumphant, beneficent. The reflec- 
tion of its own effulgence flashes back from col- 
leges and universities, from hospitals and asylums 
and other countless forms of social beneficence; 
from constitutions and laws bedded deep in its own 
supreme justice; from altar and pulpit and spire 
that point the brightening way into the holiest of 
all. And in the rapture of love triumphant it calls 
to all the world, to the great company in glory look- 
ing with unabated interest on these things, "Behold 
my servants whom I uphold; mine elect in whom 
my soul delighteth. I have put my spirit upon 
them, they shall bring forth judgment to the Gen- 
tiles. They shall not fail nor be discouraged till 
they have set judgment in the earth; and the isles 
shall wait for their law." 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 293 

But still we have not cauglit the true significance 
of the work of the Bible in the world. The intellec- 
tual and social liberty the Bible brings to men, the 
moral benefits it bestows, are as nothing compared 
with the vast spiritual uplift it accomplishes and 
supports in the individual soul. Herein there is 
no monopoly of favored nations, nor of selected 
families, nor of choice spirits. Its leaves are for 
the healing of the nations, and its blessings flow 
"far as the curse is found." It finds the sinner 
broken, helpless, orphaned, despairing ; and to him 
it stoops down to speak the quickening word, to ap- 
ply the healing balm of pardon, to inspire with 
hope of achievement, to console with dreams of 
heaven. Face to face with the sinless Christ it 
brings him, interprets to him the tender omnipo- 
tence of redeeming love and spreads abroad in his 
heart an unspeakable peace and a love that com- 
passes all men and sweeps on to God. To man 
thus redeemed, regenerated, refurnished for life the 
Bible becomes henceforth the guiding lamp, the 
wonderful counsellor, the infallible judge. It 
walks with him through life's duties, explains to 
him life's trials, comforts him in life's adversities, 
and when life here is at last emptied of all satisfac- 
tion it offers a staff with which to begin his descent 
into the valley, closes his weary eyes with a psalm 
of content and opens to him in clear vision the im- 
mortal habitations of the City of God. 

No wonder then the reverent student feels all his 



294 DIVINE CREDENTIALS 

pulses leap and every faculty quicken as he con- 
templates the glorious achievements of this book 
and the lasting blessings it has conferred upon 
man. No wonder his mind sweeps behind mere 
opinion into the firm grip of unalterable conviction 
when he undertakes to tell over the record of its 
triumphs. No wonder men have died for it and 
would still suffer a thousand deaths rather than 
give it up. The wonder is that any man is left 
without faith in it and enthusiastic devotion to it. 
The wonder is that there should be in Christendom 
and even in Christian churches those whom we 
must call "traditores," on account of their seeming 
willingness to deliver up the Bible to its enemies. 
That notwithstanding its beneficent triumphs there 
are those who from mere intellectual caprice, from 
the vagaries of uncertain criticism, from hate of its 
pure precepts or from a malicious thoughtlessness 
would dethrone the Bible and seek to bind it with 
the cords of vanity. This is the wonder and the 
shame. 

But even so our duty and our attitude to such 
are plain. That there are critics, that there are 
skeptics, nay, that there are scoffers, shall not dis- 
turb us. We refuse to give up the Bible not be- 
cause nor when all opposition to it ceases ; but be- 
cause we ourselves have tested its credentials and 
have found them divine, because the Bible meets 
and fills every thinking and feeling faculty we have. 
But we will abide in peace and wait patiently while 



DIVINE CREDENTIALS 295 

the storm of opposition rages. We refuse to give 
up the spirit of the Bible no less than the Bible it- 
self. Hence we refuse to raise an outcry against 
criticism or to rail at those who do not believe. 
There shall be no ostracism, no prisons, no fagots 
for those who reject the Bible. They shall be free 
as the Bible has made us free. Yes, free to dis- 
pute, to revile, to destroy if they can. Let the 
kings of scholarship set themselves and the rulers 
of science take counsel together. Welcome inves- 
tigation, research, discovery ! We fling out no de- 
fiance, we simply wait serene and confident that 
the word of God is not bound. 

But we will warn them "lest haply they be found 
even to fight against God;" lest in their zeal for 
light they attempt to blot out the sun ; lest in their 
pride of humanity they betray the Son of Man. And 
guided and restrained by the spirit of the Bible, 
with inextinguishable pity in our hearts for those 
who know not what they do, we will whisper our 
awful apprehension, taught us by him who is Light 
and Love supernal, "Woe unto that man by whom 
the Son of Man is betrayed! it had been good for 
that man if he had not been born." 



THE END 



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